Project Papa Movie Review: An amateurish take on the father-daughter bond

Story: Alisa, a young entrepreneur, who is swamped with work 24*7, is worried about her father’s health. She starts a personal project, named ‘Project Papa’, to fix him. Will she be able to achieve her goals?Review: Project Papa is based on the bond between a father and his daughter — a 29-year-old Alisha aka Ali (Kanika Batra), an entrepreneur, who has buried herself in work, and her father, who is about to retire. She is married to Ishaan (Rohn Malhotra), but is not able to devote time to her marriage. Alisa finds out that her aging father has started forgetting things. As soon as she realises that her father might be suffering from Alzheimer's, she panics and puts her life plans on hold. With the help of her best friend Neha (Sneha Kapoor), Ali embarks on a fix-my-Paa mission, titled ‘Project Papa'. It isn’t easy to expect from our parents to change; will Ali be able to realise this, or will she be able to accomplish her mission.It’s a thought-provoking story that revolves around two generations with very diverse belief systems – the daughter believes that it's her age to work hard and earn success and wealth, and that happiness is a thing of the future. But she finds her father old-school who believes that happiness is a thing of the past and he doesn’t deserve the same at this age. Project Papa explores the journey of how they together realise the importance of being happy now, in the present. At the beginning, Ali projects herself as a super busy girl who doesn’t have time to meet her father, even when he drops by at her workplace. Soon, she realises that her Paa is hardly the person he used to be, and she leaves everything behind and starts spending time with him. Together, they exercise, go on a diet plan, play golf, and basically, do everything they used to do earlier. This light-hearted family film reiterates that what matters in life is the time you spend with your loved ones.In terms of concept, this drama has good intentions, and in order to keep the essence of a father-daughter relationship intact, director-actor Kanika Kapoor has shot this film in a documentary style. But, this experiment backfires as the camera work looks plain shoddy. Also, the journey of the lead characters is slow-paced, barely managing to keep you hooked. In addition to this, the film's editing lacks finesse as the transition from one scene to another is often abrupt. Even the actors in this tearjerker fail to keep the viewers engaged or evoke a sense of relatibility with the universal theme. Overall, 'Project Papa' has its heart in the right place but the amateurish treatment of the central plot and its equally troubled execution makes it a tedious watch.