Cocktail 2 is a lot like the idea of love. Love is messy, complicated, egoistic, selfish, jealous, heartbreaking. But the idea of it is glossy, euphoric, aesthetic, dreamy. This film is too polished, too picture perfect, too luminous and too worried about looking fashionable all the time to dig deep into the emotional chaos, intricacies and contradictions of relationships.
Ultimately, what we’re left with is a one-tone, predictable and quintessential Bollywood love triangle where two women squabble over a man, who doesn’t quite have the pull or the comic timing of Cocktail’s Gautam (played by Saif Ali Khan). To put it plainly, Cocktail 2 is like old wine in a not-so- new bottle that we’ve tasted too many times.This is the story of college sweethearts Kunal, a chef, and Diya, who works at a corporate firm. They’re in a live-in relationship and have known each other for about 16 years. They’ve braved long distance, arguments and Covid-19 and emerged as the perfect couple who has figured it all out together or so it seems.But relatives and elders are hell bent on getting them married. The lovebirds, however, are happy just staying together without having to formalise their relationship on a piece of paper. To escape marriage questions during the wedding season, they decide to jet off to Sicily with the money they’ve saved by not splurging on a big fat Indian wedding.
There, they bump into Ally, Diya’s friend and roommate at Trueford University. The girls meet after ten long years and pick up from where they left. Ally’s entry is like a blessing in disguise as she elevates the screenplay. Now, Diya is someone who doubts her ‘green flag’ partner’s commitment towards her. To test his loyalty, she urges Ally to seduce him. Yes, you heard that right.
Ally, the voice of reason, ultimately gives in to Diya’s whims and plays along. But while role-playing, Ally genuinely falls in love with Kunal. Opposites, after all, attract. This twist is predictable from the word go. Naturally, all hell breaks lose. Now, these trio of characters is nothing we haven’t seen before.
