In the 2008 US vice-presidential debates Sarah Palin winked and made headlines. In 2016, gymnast Laurie Hernandez winked at the judges just before a competition and made a buzz. In 2018 Priya Varrier was declared as the wink queen and went on to become an overnight sensation. But unfortunately, her winking magic fails to leave an impression in her latest outing 'Oru Adaar Love'. The movie opens with the 'eyebrow raising' sequences where Roshan calls Priya and asks to wink at him.
It's the first day in school and the only thing the boys of 11th standard do in Don Bosco School is run behind girls and find a match for them. The days pass by and you will see romantic songs in class, a bunch of teachers who just come in as puppets and then there are references to filmmakers like Dileesh Pothan, Lijo Jose Pelliserry and Aashiq Abu (which seemed more of a sarcasm).
Oru Adaar Love is the tale of a high school romance that matures over time to find 'true love'.
Roshan as Roshan falls in love with Priya played by Priya Varrier, but he eventually discovers that it isn't the true love. The movie goes on with the same pace revolving around friendship and romance till the climax just to dig into an unexpected finale. However, it's the climax that stands out as a better executed sequence compared to the song-filled romance in the first half. Director Omar Lulu seems to have set the climax first and all other scenes seemed to be developed later.
There are umpteen moments in the movie with references to Premam. If it was Java sir in Premam, here it is 'Allu' Maths teacher and 'Paavam' chemistry sir. Java might be simple and powerful in Premam, but it's the Caco3 effect in Adaar Love. In Premam we saw how Ranji Panicker came to the rescue of his son and so we got to see here Salim Kumar coming to support his son and the references go on.
Noorin as Gadha is the one who grabs our attention with her performance and so does Roshan. Unfortunately, Priya has been utilised as mere 'winking' strategy for the movie and her acting skills leave a lot to be desired. There are moments between Priya and Roshan that were made just to attract the audience, but those were the least engaging scenes in the movie.
The boys gang was cool, but felt under-utilised including Arun (the child artiste from Olympian Anthony Adam). Then there are fine actors like Siddique, Anjali Upasana, Hareesh Kanaran, Aneesh Menon and Althaf who barely show their faces for a few moments. The writer in Omar seemed to struggle in establishing humour for he consciously brings in old Malayalam movie references including Spadikam.
Music director Shaan Rahman has given his best yet again, but the script makes us forget that too.
Kudos to the Adar Love team for making a buzz about the movie but thumbs down for not meeting the expectations for it's a tedious watch.