Team FC
In a normal universe, Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar is about a ‘boy’ and a ‘girl’ who fall in love only to realize that they want different things from life.But in Luv Ranjan’s universe, this same story is a bitter battle of sexes between a good-looking boy and a gorgeous girl.
The women in his previous movies (Pyaar Ka Punchnama, Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety) were scheming, conniving caricatures who forced their boyfriends to choose between bromance and romance. But here, the conflict is centered on the woman’s inability to be cruel and manipulative; she is too evolved to be the quintessential Luv Ranjan heroine.
In the pink corner lies Rohan’s courage to go from cold Casanova to heartbreaking martyr, and his pride of being a Momma’s Boy. In the blue corner lies Nisha’s reluctance to sacrifice her own ambitions at the altar of Rohan’s Barjatya-shaped love.
It’s like the film is mocking the preconceived notions of both the girl and the audience – first by staging a harmless bromance, then by staging a hidden chauvinist.But that’s giving Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar too much credit. Because the fact of the matter is that it’s Rohan who always manages to be the victim.
In a normal universe, Tu Jhoothi Main Makkaar might have been yet another Luv Ranjan movie about love in the time of incels. But in a universe – and a culture – where women are conditioned to blame themselves for all that fails, Tu Jhoothi Main Makkar feels like a Luv Ranjan movie striving to be an Imtiaz Ali film. One dies a woman-trolling villain, and the other lives long enough to look like a woke hero.