First things first. Sitaare Zameen Par is NOT a scene-by-scene adaptation of Champions or Campeones. Aamir Khan and his team have Indianized the story well and added their own bits. An original scene in the second half is very funny and brings the house down. The film’s first hour is shorter and is just alright, with a few scenes making an impact. But it’s the second half where the film shows its brilliance. The film goes to another level in the last 40-45 minutes. The finale will induce a lot of emotions in the viewers and the final scene along with the end credit visuals is heartening. Unlike Taare Zameen Par, Sitaare Zameen Par is not a tearjerker. Yet, it has enough moments that touch the heart and at the same time, educate viewers about neurodivergent people without getting preachy. The film has some minuses – a few comic scenes don’t land properly; some developments are convenient while the music is poor. But thankfully, the plusses outweigh the minuses. Aamir Khan is once again in superb form and gets into the skin of the character effortlessly. Genelia Deshmukh has a soothing screen presence and is superb as a performer. She proves yet again why she deserves to be seen more. Gurpal Singh (Kartar) and Dolly Ahluwalia (Gulshan’s mother) leave a huge mark. Brijendra Kala (Daulat) seems wasted at first but is the biggest surprise of the film. Deepraj Rana (Paswan) and Tarana Raja (Judge) are lovely in cameos. As for the ‘sitaares‘, Ashish Pendse (Sunil), Aayush Bhansali (Lotus), GopiKrishnan K Verma (Guddu) and Simran Mangeshkar (Golu) leave the maximum impact followed by Aroush Datta (Satbir), Rishi Shahani (Sharma ji), Rishabh Jain (Raju), Vedant Sharma (Bantu) and Samvit Desai (Kareem Qureshi). Naman Misra (Hargovind) stands out too. All in all, Sitaare Zameen Par is meaningful yet very entertaining. Kudos to Aamir Khan for backing such a project, doing total justice to it and also betting highly on theatrical (he hasn’t sold the OTT rights yet, a RARITY in today’s times for a big-sized film). This one is worth watching in cinemas; DON’T MISS!
My rating – **** out of 5!