Mannu Kya Karegga review: A confused tale of a lost boy that misses the mark despite strong performances

Attempting to ground dreamy romances, Mannu Kya Karegga tries to balance mainstream rom-com aesthetics with logical sensibilities but caught between the two, it never quite finds its footing!

The world has dissected Saiyaara to no end, but the most common critique I’ve heard is “How does a film like this even work?"  But isn’t that the very point of romance. To sweep you off your feet and make logic irrelevant! Maybe for films like that, the defense is rather simple - you either feel it or you don’t. But, wouldn’t it be refreshing if a little logic did slip into that sweep-you-away formula? That’s exactly what Mannu Kya Karegga aims to be - a rom-com that balances starry-eyed love with the struggles of a restless generation. And while the idea of being a grounded version of films like Saiyaara seems solid, it never quite gets there in this film.

The story unfolds as a coming-of-age tale of Manav aka Mannu (Vyom Yadav), a jack of all trades, master of none, who’s as lost as he is fun. You know that one guy in every small-town who’s the go-to person for anything and everything? That’s Mannu. From digging up details about potential marriage matches to helping out at weddings, he always has answers for others but just not for himself as he still can’t figure out the purpose of his own life. Surrounded by an uber-cool dad (Kumud Mishra), a no-nonsense mentor, Don, the “Dean of Nothing” (Vinay Pathak), and a critical mother (Charu Shankar), Mannu bounces from literature to philosophy to coding and AI. Yet, if there’s one constant in his scattered journey, it’s his love for football. Enter Jiya (Saachi Bindra), a girl who knows exactly what she wants. She’s determined to go to the US for higher education and equally firm about not marrying just to satisfy her father, who fears she might follow in her elder sister’s footsteps and choose a live-in relationship. Their worlds collide, and soon begins a journey of self-discovery entwined with the charms of first love, where one lie pushes Mannu to confront what he really wants from life.

Also Read: Do You Wanna Partner review: Despite a solid premise and a promising ensemble cast, this 8-episode series lacks in all departments - script, dialogues and common sense!

This campus-life rom-com has all the ingredients to become the coming-of-age tale of today as it taps into one of the biggest struggles of young adults of having endless options, yet finding it hardest to commit to just one. The intention is commendable, but much like its protagonist, the film itself feels confused. Mannu is this genius who plays football like a pro, codes in seconds, and spins a lie like anything. But just as he can’t use these skills to rescue his love life from inevitable doom, the film too tries to take on too much at once. It wants to critique an education system that cages talent, comment on a generation overly dependent on AI, and even slip in the wisdom of ikigai as a way of life. On paper, these ideas are fruitful, yet on screen, they feel rushed. As if small moments of Reels joined together to make a film that is in such a hurry to say everything that it forgets to balance its voice. At one moment it wants to be a mainstream Bollywood romance complete with picturesque Dehradun backdrops and dreamy song-and-dance sequences. At another, it tries to inject logic and realism with a climate change tour that doubles as a flirting exercise for the leads.

In trying to be all things at once, it loses sight of the most essential ingredient of any love story - emotions! Scenes move so fast that characters barely catch up to their own feelings before they move on. For instance, even before Jiya calls out Mannu’s short-tempered personality, he’s already switched gears into the understanding boyfriend, before Mannu even convinces her of his lie of a start up, she starts to believe and live in it! And hence the film's pattern becomes to spell things out instead of letting emotions breathe, leaving little room to feel them or get convinced of the natural progression of the film. As a result, the first half plays like a frivolous rush through the excitement of falling in love while the second half struggles to carry the weight of heartbreak and broken dreams. The film wants to be heartfelt and meaningful, but ends up trying too hard and, in the process, misses the very magic of the coming of age romance it set out to capture. Even Lalit Pandit’s music feels more like a filler than a meaningful addition to the story, and not even an acclaimed cast like the ever charming Vinay Pathak and Kumud Mishra could salvage it. 

In their theatrical debuts, Vyom Yadav does his best to bring nuance to the ever-confused Mannu while Saachi Bindra works hard to add emotional depth to her otherwise one-note character. But the film gives them little beyond surface-level material to work with. What could have been an interesting attempt to pull the “too-illogical” rom-com genre out of the guilty-pleasure box of hopeless romantics instead becomes a lost opportunity. In the end, I couldn’t help but wish that just like Mannu finds ikigai as a path to enlightenment, Mannu Kya Karegga would've found it too and benefitted from it!

Mannu Kya Karegga is now running in theatres near you.

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