Reel humane story

Ananya Panday can take credit for making influencers mainstream in Bollywood. First, it was her portrayal of Bella, an influencer in ‘Call Me Bae’, and now Nella in ‘CTRL’, whose life revolves around likes and subscribes. And going by her performance, we can say that she has full control over this particular subject.

The plot takes us back to 2018, to a college cultural fest where Nella and Joe meet. They hit it off from the word go, and unite to rock social media with their digital channel Njoy. The joy, however, does not last long as Nella catches her boyfriend with another girl. What happens next is Nella dealing with a breakup, picking up her digital pieces with tips from AI-powered personal assistant Allen.

If Anushka Sharma gave Gen Y a breakup anthem in the form of ‘Dil pe patthar rakh ke maine makeup kar liya…,’ in ‘Ae Dil Hai Mushkil’, Ananya Panday has given us some interesting hashtags to mull over: #bhaadmainjoe, #joewho.

As Joe vents out his frustration by telling her how unreal their relationship is where everything is done keeping social media in mind, Nella calls him ‘Internet messiah’ and ‘Internet ka Bhagat Singh’. When Internet takes Joe’s side after they part ways, she tells him, “Tu Kiran, main Shah Rukh?” Dialogue writer Sumukhi Suresh brings in the Gen Z vibe and saves this overstretched breakup drama from falling flat.

Directed by Vikramaditya Motwane, who has co-written the screenplay along with Avinash Sampath, this love-story-gone-sour narrative takes a powerful stance on the omnipresent Internet’s influence on our lives. Soon, it takes the tone of a thriller, with Joe going missing and people being eliminated. Joe too suffers a similar fate. His murder turns Nella into an online sleuth and she finds a video in which Joe, a member of a tech group, reveals Mantra Unlimited’s dubious Project Unicorn.

Big companies prying into people’s digital lives to sell their products and safeguard their interests, a premise on which the film is based, is not a revelation. But the execution of the story is. A major part of the story unfolds online. Romance, conversations, confessions, sleuthing — everything happens on video calls or laptop screens. Even when Nella falls victim to the conspiracy and gets arrested on charges of her ex’s murder, only the pop-up informations and some video recordings provide the thrill factor. There are no chases, no high-decibel court scenes.

Motwane keeps the tone of the film natural. Most of the scenes are shot in natural light, making them look real. When Nella tries to open the CTRL app or tries to hack Joe’s email accounts, the entire process is so organic that we feel as if we are logging in. It is relatable alright, but exasperating too.

Motwane, however, forgets to pay much attention to the reels that the couple created for Njoy. The reels are juvenile, at best, and tacky, at worst. Maybe in a country where dancing in a metro has proven to be the sure-shot way to viral fame, Motwane felt that he could take things easy.

While Jahaan Noble’s sharp editing keeps the narrative tout and racy, the storyline dwells on the surface. It runs more like a reel, till Motwane redeems it with the climax. Nella, now out of jail and back in Delhi with her parents, downloads the CTRL app once more and chooses an AI-assistant called Joe. She asks him to take control of her life and happiness. No drama. With only a few teardrops and an unnatural grin, Motwane turns this reel into a humane story.