Namaste England review: Regressive ideas, shoddy plot and treatment doom this Arjun Kapoor-Parineeti Chopra starrer

Some things in the Hindi film industry never change. Salman Khan will remain a superstar. South Indians will always be dark. And Punjabis always want to leave this country.

Vipul Shah's Namaste England just takes the long scenic route to London via Dhaka, Brussels and Paris in search of love after marriage. Not that the journey is any better than the film.

The story belongs to Param (Arjun Kapoor) and Jasmeet (Parineeti Chopra), lovers who are now married and seeking a way to London. The reason is Jasmeet's archaic grandfather who continues to think women are breeding machines and should not work.

Param, who is a good guy, loves Jasmeet too much to ask her to shelve her dreams of being a jewellery designer.

Of course, moving to London is not that simple. Especially since Param beat up the only guy in Punjab who issues passports, on his wedding day. While Scotch is known to be the devil's drink, the only reason for a friend behaving like that on Param's wedding day is possibly the script. The fact that this friend was not stopped by his other pals makes one question Param's other friends too.

But Jasmeet is not one to give up. When Param refuses to try the illegal route, she decides to sign up for a fake marriage to go abroad and get a residency in London. Param, who is a good guy, is still in love with her and decides to pursue her to foreign shores. 

There are a lot of things wrong with Namaste England, beginning with the forced nature of its feminism. While it is the theme of the year and has a certain currency, the film transforms Jasmeet's character into a caricature of everything that the ideology stands for. Despite her ardent advocacy of a girl's rights and struggles, she is constantly hiding behind a marriage to escape.

Of course, when she does arrive in London she does not take up a job, other than that of prancing around in fashionable dresses. The reasoning of her 'residency' is quite far-fetched since the man she is fake-married to drives a Rolls Royce. The least he could have done is set up a business for his new 'wife'.

Param is another flawed character that refuses to rise above his vanilla nature. His reasons for pursuing Jasmeet are as creepy as the way he tried to woo her initially. To boot, in its attempts to make the character appear like a modern, liberal man, the film makes his regressive mentality even more apparent. 

Then there is the plot and screenplay. There are more holes in the plot of Namaste England than potholes in some of the roads in Andheri, Mumbai. Vipul Shah's film does target the usual themes of the difficulty of being away from the homeland, the constant nature of true love, and the complimentary wannabe NRI who insults India to raise the patriotic temper of the film. That the NRI was subjected to wearing a shiny jacket that would stand out in a dandiya raas, let alone in a hoity-toity Londoner socialite party, is a statement in and of itself. 

The characters are flaky, and their reasons are flimsy and unacceptable at times. 

The film could have been cut an hour short by a good editor, and improved. There are several parts that serve for nothing other than to enhance the music, which, to be honest, is quite impressive. 

This does not mean Namaste England has nothing to teach us. The constant obsession of the characters with going abroad to better their lives is a sign of the falling employment rates in India. London, evidently, is the new Canada. The film also has a very educational track about the possibilities of an illegal conduit through Dhaka to Brussels, Paris and London. Of course, all such journeys are subject to transport risks, and a clear emphasis is placed on the risks of said journey. 

Arjun Kapoor and Parineeti Chopra do not help to redeem the script. While Kapoor plays the good guy in love part a little too sincerely to believe, Chopra is unconvincing in her role as the ambitious woman. She neither comes across as a daring, uncaring career girl, nor as a romantic. 

Either way, it is not enough to convince one to visit Namaste England.