Perfectly adorable

It is a performances centric movie

It's a mild crowd pleaser for people who are exhausted by blockbusters.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Bit of a cult movie this which gained more popularity overseas as the idea of a man trying to suppress feelings for the identikit daughter of his first love did not go down well with conservative Indian audiences. So fair play to Yash Chopra for tackling one of many taboo Indian issues (still no lip kissing though - even in the 90s) and obviously with Sridevi's passing, this becomes more of a poignant watch and an appreciation of her beauty, energy, comedy, dance talent and strong delivery dialogue that she maintained throughout her career. The surprises are Anupam Kher who is given over-the-top free rein as Anil Kapoor's best mate and 50s-60s icon Waheeda Rehman. They come to the fore in the classic song medley designed to cheer Anil Kapoor up as he mulls indeterminately over his first lost love - who didn't love him anyway. Look out especially for the clever Guide and Pyaasa nods. And that's the main problem with this movie - Anil Kapoor is wasted in his dour and wooden lead role - especially when you see the powerful moments when he does release emotions. Even then he is more charasmatic than Sridevi (mark one)'s husband - who even dressed up as an air force pilot fails to generate any screen presence. So many typical Bollywood features - lavish sets, lots of unbelievability (daughter looks exactly like her mum, how is Anil Kapoor so rich, who exactly is Waheeda Rehman and would you allow your best mate to live freely in palatial mansions, driving Mercs, jetting back and forth from India to England), great songs and overlong duration - the picnic scene could go straight out for example. Strangely enjoyable still.

"Lamhe" portrays an unconventional love story of an undeniable love of a girl with a man almost twice her age; and this unconventional story makes the film special. The film raises complexity in its theme which has been resolved very beautifully by the end. Like most of the Yash Chopra films, this one too has a nice look with good songs, pictuarization, and a winning performance from Sri Devi. Perhaps, it's a wonder why this film didn't click at the time it released; and by now the film has received a cult status.The only thing that annoyed was its over 3 hr length and a slow pace at times.Rating: 2 stars out of 4

I understand that the subject matter of LAMHE was controversial, and I understand why. Yet it's a watchable film that deals with confronting matters of the heart. It's a very Bollywood film with plenty of color and music/dancing within the first 10 minutes, but it's got twists and turns worthy of Tour de France. Shockingly there's not one kiss exchanged in this - maybe I never noticed when watching other films from India that it might be a cultural no-no - but it doesn't detract from a well- played story with some pretty heavy drama. At least five times, my jaw dropped as a plot twist quickly redefined the film. Save for one, they were moments that I didn't see coming, but I guess were necessary to keep a film running for over three hours.Sridevi did a great job to express the feelings while in character. And you could almost fall in love with her yourself, with the smile and those huge doe-like eyes. I can get a little frustrated with how some of the characters try manipulating others, but the subject matter of love begs for some people to question that love. I'm trying to be as vague as possible so as not to spoil this. If you have a chance to watch LAMHE, avoid reading spoilers, they will really destroy your watching experience.

Apparently a better Bollywood romantic drama in that the outcome is not blatantly clear from the beginning. Still, I - a westerner - found this difficult to digest. The quality of the English dubbing was very poor and so it is hard to tell how well the dialogue works in the original.Especially annoying are the scenes showing gratuitous wealth, e.g. when our hero leaves his home in a variety of expensive cars. This does not add one iota to the story and its only purpose is to feed the imagination of a (comparatively) poor audience. A dance scene left me rather puzzled: it seemed to be an Indian version of the famous auditioning dance from Flashdance; alas, as far as I could see it was completely unconnected to anything else.