131. Dev; movie review

DEV
Cert 12A
157 mins

BBFC advice: Contains moderate violence, sex references, brief sexual threat

If life were only this simple. Lovelorn playboy scours Facebook for the girl of his dreams, falls in love at first thumbnail and somehow expects the high-powered businesswoman to return his naivety.
The thing is that, in Rajath Ravishankar's Dev, she does.
Yep, who could resist the charms of Karthi's title character? Surely not the uptight Meghna (Rakul Preet Singh).
The only plus point about this movie is its soundtrack. The songs are catchy and the choreography matches them.
The rest of the movie is schmaltz and poppycock.
Dev is two and a half hours of Karthi's fawning, punctuated with a couple of fight scenes which prove that a hyper-romantic can also kick ass.

From the start, the movie is preposterous. Dev, action hero and son of a super-rich businessman is presented as super-confident but has never had a proper girlfriend.
I could try to park that Karthi is 42 and not 18 but even then such ineptitude with females, given his background, seems unbelievable.
The incredulity is stretched even further by the way he romances a woman who he only knows via her photo on Facebook.
Meanwhile, she, after initially spurning him because he is one of the hundreds of men who try to attract her attention on social media, melts because he keeps following her around.
That is only the beginning of the fantasy. When they start dating, the craziness stretches to a whole new level.
Some people may say that cinema is escapism and, therefore, I should not look closely at the plot detail of films.
I disagree when it comes to movies which explore relationships such as the one in Dev.
I simply couldn't buy into it because every twist and turn required me to park all experience of life and buy into timescales which were impossible and actions which just would not happen.


Reasons to watch: Karthi in irrepresible form
Reasons to avoid: So many unbelievable scenarios

Laughs: None
Jumps: None
Vomit: None
Nudity: None
Overall rating: 3.5/10

Did you know? In the first six months of 2017, 203 men were arrested in Delhi for stalking while 259 cases were registered.

The final word. Rajath Ravishankar: "Karthi plays a youngster with amazing clarity. The film will portray his happiness, sorrow, anger, love, and friendship."

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