40 minutes into 'The Archies', I gave up

I was very excited about 'The Archies' because I was looking forward to see if Suhana Khan has even one percent of aura that her father and superstar Shah Rukh Khan has. I wanted to see if Khushi Kapoor will have a better debut than Janhvi Kapoor, and if Agastya Nanda, nephew of Abhishek Bachchan and grandson of Amitabh Bachchan, has it in him to live up to the reputation his family has in the film industry. 

However, I could only watch the film for 40 minutes. Why? I felt it was extremely boring, all over the place and not the kind of musical I am a fan of. 

Suhana Khan doesn't have a screen presence. Apologies if it may sound hurtful but she is totally missable. If she's a part of a dancing sequence, you'd notice background dancers more than her. Khushi, I felt, was much better. She sounds A LOT like Janhvi Kapoor. So much so that you feel that Janhvi might have dubbed for her little sister. She has screen presence but lacks expression (case with many newbies). 

Suhana is impressive in the 'Dhishoom Dhishoom' song. She's smooth as butter on roller skates.

In the 40 minutes I watched, I was quite impressed with Agastya Nanda. He is charming and has an amazing screen presence. He has a very chocolate boy persona, which made him a perfect casting for the role of Archie. His on-screen aura is very different than Abhishek and Amitabh's, which might work for him in the future as well.

The story of 'The Archies' doesn't move ahead for the longest time. It is slow. Suhana as Veronica gets a little too much dramatic. A lot of times, especially in the initial 40 minutes, both Suhana and Khushi's dialogue delivery felt like they're reading the dialogues out from the script. Their dialogue delivery lacked expressions and conviction. 

Well, I will just wrap it up by saying that Abram's 1 minute video from his school play is much better than 'The Archies'. Abram did much better than many of the actors in this Netflix original.

But yes, I will still give it another chance and maybe come back here to pen if I feel anything different about this Zoya Akhtar's project. 


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