There is an easygoing sweetness to Prem Keetanu that makes portions of it genuinely enjoyable. The friendships feel lively, the college humour occasionally lands exactly where it should, and Veer Pahariya proves surprisingly comfortable playing a young man whose romantic confidence is considerably greater than his actual understanding of relationships.
The problem is that nearly every time Prem Keetanu begins developing a personality of its own, you can feel Premalu sitting underneath it.
Directed by Apoorv Singh Karki, the Hindi romantic comedy adapts Girish A.D.’s hugely popular 2024 Malayalam film into a story that moves through Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Gurgaon. Veer Pahariya plays Vishal Thakur, an unemployed engineering graduate stumbling through early adulthood with his best friend Magan, played by Nikhil Vijay. Things change when Vishal meets ambitious working professional Suhani, played by Aafiya Sayed, and falls for her almost immediately.
Aparshakti Khurana enters the equation as Ranjeet, Suhani’s overconfident colleague and another man convinced he understands what she needs.
The broad ingredients are familiar even without knowledge of Premalu: immature boy, ambitious girl, irritating romantic rival, loyal best friend and enough awkward situations to sustain a coming-of-age rom-com.
At 2 hours and 18 minutes, though, Prem Keetanu sometimes stretches those ingredients considerably further than necessary.
PopcornRealm Rating: 3/5
Veer Pahariya is at his best when Vishal is allowed to be ridiculous
The film’s biggest advantage is that Veer Pahariya understands Vishal should not be played as a traditional romantic hero.
He is needy, confused, occasionally embarrassing and far less emotionally mature than he believes. That makes him funnier.
Pahariya’s comic timing is particularly effective in scenes with Nikhil Vijay, where the movie stops worrying about romance for a few minutes and simply lets two directionless young men behave like directionless young men. Several early reviews have also singled out Pahariya’s humour as one of the film’s stronger elements, with Hindustan Times praising his comic timing and Times of India describing the film as breezy and youthful despite its familiar plotting.
There is an important difference between being charming and being convincing as a romantic lead.
Pahariya mostly manages both, but the screenplay helps him more with the former.
Vishal is entertaining when he is failing interviews, misreading social situations or discussing love with Magan. He becomes less interesting whenever the movie tries too hard to transform those flaws into conventional hero moments.
That is where the remake begins smoothing out the awkwardness that made the original premise work so well.
Aafiya Sayed gives Suhani confidence, but the romance needs more space
Aafiya Sayed makes a confident impression as Suhani.
She has a steadier presence than Vishal, which is exactly what the relationship requires. Suhani has a job, plans and a clearer understanding of adulthood, while Vishal is still trying to determine where he is going.
Their imbalance should be the heart of the movie.
Sometimes it is.
The film is most appealing when Vishal’s attraction is obviously one-sided and he must slowly accept that being deeply interested in someone does not automatically create a relationship. Those moments allow Prem Keetanu to say something useful about young love: rejection is not necessarily tragedy, and affection does not create entitlement.
But the screenplay moves through so many familiar rom-com checkpoints that Suhani occasionally becomes the destination of Vishal’s coming-of-age arc rather than a fully developed person inside it.
That weakens the emotional pull.
Hindustan Times similarly found the central love story less compelling than the comedy around it, arguing that the romance needed greater emotional depth.
Aafiya does what she can to resist that limitation. She gives Suhani enough confidence and frustration that you understand why Vishal’s behaviour can be both amusing from a distance and exhausting up close.
The movie simply needed more of her perspective.
Nikhil Vijay may quietly be the film’s MVP
Every romantic comedy about an immature man needs a friend who understands exactly how ridiculous he is.
Here, that person is Magan.
Nikhil Vijay gets some of the film’s funniest exchanges because his character is allowed to exist without carrying the burden of romantic destiny. He can observe Vishal, insult him, encourage him and occasionally participate in his terrible decisions without the screenplay demanding a major transformation.
That freedom makes Magan feel natural.
Multiple reviews have highlighted Vijay as a comic standout, and it is easy to see why.
The Vishal-Magan friendship is also where Karki’s background in character-driven comedy works best. There is a loose, conversational rhythm to their scenes that disappears whenever the movie shifts into broader romantic conflict.
Had Prem Keetanu trusted that dynamic more consistently, it might have developed a stronger personality of its own.
Aparshakti Khurana gets stuck playing the obvious obstacle
Aparshakti Khurana has enough comic instinct to make Ranjeet entertaining, but the character is written in capital letters.
He is smug.
He is possessive.
He believes Suhani is naturally going to choose him.
And the film makes sure we understand all three qualities almost immediately.
That creates easy laughs, but not much surprise.
Khurana plays the arrogance well and avoids turning Ranjeet into complete dead weight, yet the movie rarely allows him the oddness or specificity that could make a familiar romantic rival memorable.
The Hollywood Reporter India was considerably harsher on the adaptation overall, arguing that the Hindi remake flattens much of Premalu’s cultural rhythm and keeps switching between campus comedy, romantic rivalry and coming-of-age drama without finding a consistent tone.
That criticism is especially visible whenever Ranjeet dominates the plot.
His presence pushes Prem Keetanu toward a more conventional love triangle when its strongest material lies elsewhere: young adults figuring out jobs, independence, friendships and what exactly they expect love to fix.
The ‘Premalu’ comparison is impossible to avoid
Ordinarily, it would be unfair to review one film solely through another.
Here, the comparison is unavoidable because Prem Keetanu is an official Hindi remake of Premalu.
The challenge is not reproducing the story. It is reproducing the feeling.
Premalu succeeded because its humour felt casual. Its characters seemed to stumble into jokes rather than wait for punchlines. Hyderabad was not merely a location; it shaped how the characters met, worked, travelled and imagined adulthood.
Prem Keetanu retains the broad narrative but Bollywoodises the presentation.
The soundtrack becomes more prominent. Romantic beats become larger. Certain characters are more clearly separated into hero, heroine and rival. The film moves between youthful comedy and mainstream romance rather than allowing those things to blur naturally.
For viewers who have never seen Premalu, that may not be a major problem.
For those who have, it is difficult not to notice how much spontaneity has been replaced by design.
Cinema Express went much further, giving the film a sharply negative review and arguing that the remake fails to understand what made the original work.
That assessment feels excessive because Prem Keetanu is not devoid of charm.
But the underlying criticism is fair.
This is a film that often understands the events of Premalu better than it understands its rhythm.
Seven songs are a lot for a film that already runs 138 minutes
Romantic comedies can absolutely benefit from music.
Prem Keetanu has enough youthful energy for songs to make sense, and the UP-to-NCR setting gives the soundtrack room to shift moods as Vishal’s life changes.
The issue is quantity.
Hindustan Times notes that the film contains seven songs and argues that the frequent musical interruptions contribute to the uneven pacing.
That becomes increasingly noticeable in the second half.
At 138 minutes, the movie does not need every subplot, song and romantic complication it keeps. Several scenes repeat emotional information we already understand: Vishal is heartbroken, Vishal is jealous, Ranjeet is irritating, Suhani is frustrated.
A tighter edit would have helped enormously.
The first half moves much more smoothly because college life, friendship and first attraction provide natural momentum. Later, when the film needs emotional escalation, the screenplay becomes more mechanical.
The jokes slow down.
The romantic conflict becomes louder.
And the story begins searching for a big payoff to material that worked better when it was small.
The film works best when it is about growing up, not winning the girl
This is where Prem Keetanu almost becomes a better movie than its conventional structure allows.
Vishal begins as someone who assumes his real problem is that he has not found the right girl.
It is not.
He has no job, little direction and a habit of interpreting every setback as something happening to him rather than something requiring him to change.
Love becomes useful because rejection forces him to confront that.
That is the movie hiding underneath the love triangle.
Times of India similarly describes the film as a story about one-sided love, independence and figuring out life, and that coming-of-age angle is ultimately more compelling than the question of which man Suhani prefers.
The film should have trusted it more.
Instead, it periodically returns to familiar romantic-comedy machinery because that feels safer.
That choice keeps Prem Keetanu watchable, but it also prevents it from becoming memorable.
‘Prem Keetanu’ is pleasant enough, but it needed more of its own personality
There is plenty here to like.
Veer Pahariya shows genuine comic instinct. Aafiya Sayed makes a promising debut. Nikhil Vijay frequently steals scenes without forcing them. The first half has an appealing looseness, and the film understands the embarrassing intensity with which people in their early twenties can experience completely ordinary romantic setbacks.
What it lacks is surprise.
The central relationship follows a familiar path, the rival is too obviously designed to be disliked and the second half stretches material that would have benefited from greater restraint.
Most importantly, Prem Keetanu never fully answers the question every remake eventually faces:
Why does this version need to exist?
Moving Premalu into North India is not enough on its own. The best remakes use a new cultural setting to uncover something the original could not. Prem Keetanu occasionally gets close — particularly through its NCR workplace setting and Vishal’s uncertainty about employment and adulthood — but usually returns to the safety of the original framework before developing those ideas.
Still, this is far from an unpleasant watch.
For viewers looking for a light theatrical rom-com with friendship, campus nostalgia and a few genuinely funny performances, it delivers enough.
For anyone who already fell in love with Premalu, though, Prem Keetanu may feel less like discovering the love bug again and more like catching a milder strain of something very familiar.
PopcornRealm Rating: 3/5
