Meet Barfi, the Indian Harpo Marx. Deaf, mute n’ cute. That was a new one – in Barfi! we actually get a “mute cute” between Barfi (Ranbir Kapoor) and his would-be squeeze for Act I Shruti (Ileana D’Cruz). I was immediately put in the mind of the opening scenes of Notebook where Ryan Gosling simply won’t leave Rachel McAdams alone — when he’s a hunk, you call it persistent, in real life, we call it stalking. To tell the truth, I was a bit alarmed until I realized Barfi is a completely asexual persona. Stalking just doesn’t have the same ring when rape is off the table. And at that moment, I started enjoying Barfi! a great deal.
Hindi Harpo here likes getting his heart stomped on. His pursuit of Shruti is adorable, but she’s made no bones about her having a fiancée, one that doesn’t live on fantasy. Barfi! 
tries to make believe that she would be better off with the playful deaf mute, but we know better. And when Barfi is left speechless and heartless out in the rain, he must focus his attention elsewhere.
I should point out there’s a lot of shtick in between. You can’t have a playful deaf-mute as your hero without having, say, a scene where a ladder straddling atop wall perpendicularly leans to-and-fro with our hero in the center and groups of rival law enforcers on either side trying to catch him.
With Shruti out of the picture, Barfi turns his attentions on Jhilmil (Priyanka Chopra) an autistic girl attached to a wealthy family. You’ll have to believe me when I say it’s not actually disturbing. At one point, Barfi, on the run from the law, encounters Jhilmil being kidnapped. To lure her away, Barfi surrounds fireflies with whammo bubbles. In the early evening, the “flylight” if you will, the insects light up showing the paisley-colored translucence of morphing bubble enclosure. It is so simple and yet so visually imaginative it’s hard to believe creativity like this still exists. Jhilmil follows him blindly after this point. I did, too. There was nothing to critique from here on in. Deaf-mute, subtitles for the few words spoken, asexual romance with and autistic girl and “barf” in the title and it’s delightful – I love it when my natural cynicism folds.
♪Barfi is a friend
Yeah, I know he’s been a mute friend of mine
But lately something’s happened
Ain’t hard to define
Barfi took autistic Jhilmil
And I wanna make him mine♫
Not Rated, 151 Minutes
D: Anurag Basu
W: Anurag Basu, Sanjeev Dutta
Genre: Bizarre asexual romance
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Hopeless romantics
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: The shenanigan intolerant
