Daawat-e-Ishq

Why is a film based on dowry and it's ill effects sold on the concept of falling in love over food? Yes the culinary arts influence the lead characters in this film. But not to the extent where food becomes the fabric of love. The reality of Daawat-e-Ishq is that it's a film that highlights the social evil of dowry. The movie even starts with a disclaimer on the issue. "A bride is burnt every hour in our country over dowry". No sign of delectable love, yet.

So the story kicks off with a quintessential Hyderbadi family. There's a honest to his last nerve-ending kind of father played by Anupam Kher. There's his very hard working, intelligent and quite beautiful daughter Gulrayz played by Parineeti Chopra. The mother has long passed away and father daughter are quite the inseparable bunch. The most pressing problem in their life is Gulrayz' marriage and the heavy dowry demands it brings. The father can only shell out 15 lakhs which is never enough and almost always ends up in a scenario where Kher's honest character is embarrassed and humiliated. Things turn for the worse when the same happens with a boy and his Jubilee Hills family. Only this time Gulrayz is in love. But the moment dowry appears in the form of educational aid to go study in the US, Gulrayz loses the plot. She hatches her own little con. Planning to catch a money grubbing family on camera asking for hefty money and then extracting her pound of flesh with the anti dowry law of Section 498A. So far so good. But where's the daawat?

The daawat comes much later in the first half of the movie. When father and daughter execute their plan in Lucknow on the unsuspecting Aditya Roy Kapur and his wealthy hotelier family. The operative word being hotel. It's here that kebabs and biryani and phirni become the flavour of love. Sounds appetizing? It is for exactly 10 minutes. A two-hour film called Daawat-e-Ishq could've served ambrosia and we would've fallen in love. But all it does is to serve up a few seekhs of kebabs and a little roadside chaat. But can that truly satiate any love for gastronomy?
It doesn't. Writer Habib Faisal got the recipe wrong. The dowry ka tadka is fine. The con job seasoning is okay as well. But the mouth-watering concept of food and love is brushed aside in the form of two songs and a few montages. No amount of good cooking can save the wrong choice of ingredients. That's why Faisal's top level direction and some very nice performances by Parineeti Chopra and Aditya Roy Kapur end up feeling like thanda samosas. Some scenes like the timely unfurling of the sale banner and the reflection of guilt in the train window glass are a testament to a director in top form. But good films are best cooked with good recipes.

Even the spicy and spirited performances by Parineeti and Aditya fail to satiate one's appetite for real drama. Even Sajid Wajid's tasteful music goes to sheer waste. This could've been a real seven-course fiesta but the misguided vision and thanda drama reduce this feature film to side dish status. Nothing wrong in it technically. A side dish can be the perfect complement to a good meal. But it can never be a stomach full. No matter how much you stuff yourself with it.