Review: Pati Patni Aur Woh

Release date: December 6, 2019
Running time: 126 minutes
Starring: Kartik Aaryan, Bhumi Pednekar, Ananya Panday

Pati Patni Aur Woh tells the tale of an ordinary, middle class married man who, after three years of marriage, starts to get a wandering eye when a new work relationship starts to bloom.  As his new relationship grows, he is faced with ever more difficult problems trying to keep his now double life separate.  He is helped, usually hilariously and sometimes begrudgingly, by his best friend who he has known since childhood.  

Pati Patni has a likable cast with some really fun characters.  Although I didn't love Abhinav (the main character), I really liked his wife Vedika and his new love interest Tapasya.  Additionally, his childhood friend Fahim adds some hilarious comic relief and becomes the focus of every scene he is in.  The nature of this film means that there are several ridiculous situations as Abhinav tries to keep the two women in his life from meeting, and many of these offer a fair share of laughs.  The lengths that Abhinav must go to in order to keep his double life happening can be entertaining to watch.  

However, the ending of this film soured the movie for me, as did the overall message that is portrayed.  The movie starts off as a comedy and partway through, moves to more of a drama.  The shift was fine--I like movies that have more depth--but unfortunately, after some interesting drama it feels like the film tries to wrap everything up quickly.  Essentially, it feels like the movie tried to make a happy ending out of a very complicated situation, one that could have been much more beneficial to explore.  I thought, in the end, the movie did not have a very good message to send and that if it had ended differently, it could have been more of a breath of fresh air.  Some of the topics that are discussed in the film seem like important issues in India, and the movie then seems to brush them all aside as it rushes to a conclusion.  At 2 hours and 6 minutes, the movie is fairly short for a Hindi film and it feels like more could have been added to make the overall tale more satisfying.

Pati Patni Aur Woh has entertaining moments with a likable cast who are put in some very ridiculous situations.  However, the film's rush to conclusion and desire to shoehorn a happy ending hurts the overall message.  

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