This is a tender film. Tender in how sounds. Tender with how its deep dive into unsaid emotions turns a hardcore rom-com premise into something like a softie, as opposed to kulfis. This metaphor runs in parallel with Rafi’s character arc.

The film has few extremely endearing moments filled with humanity. The feeling provided by the Campa Cola thread is one of such fulfillment. We don’t even get conventional closure for it, as in we never see Miloni receiving (and reacting to) the bottle from Rafi, but just the display of him going to that extent is immensely rewarding. I loved the subtlety of these parts.

But the film can, very obviously, come across as being overly subtle about things. It is about two subtle personalities, in stark contrast to the grounded yet animated duo from Batra’s previous, The Lunchbox. I do not want to call this lack of energy a glitch, but the slow pace gets off-putting at times when neither the characters nor the scene have much to say. But then we get elements like Tiwari’s “ghost” that ironically, adds life to the proceedings.

It might end on a sombre note, but I do like the kind of hope the film harvests by then. It stops far short of greatness in my eyes, but for now I am going to hold onto the parts I like.