Looop Lapeta Film Review: A stylish, if trivial, Run Lola Run remake

If something bugs you about a movie, no matter how small or insignificant, it just does. There’s no getting around it. In Looop Lapeta, clearly set in Goa, the names of places are switched up: Napusa for Mapusa, Tandovi river for Mandovi river, Paula Dona for Dona Paula. I’ve been to Goa just twice, yet the changes irk. The human ear is trained for accuracy. If you’re going to bend reality, at least do it with some purpose.

Purpose was abundant when Tom Tyker directed Run Lola Run several years ago. I’d seen the film in college—it’s one of those titles you just can’t miss. Hip, frenetic, the film combined multiple threads—cinematic as well as philosophical—yet all I remember is Franka Potente’s sweaty face as she darted through blurs of Berlin traffic. She ran because she really had to—and fast.

Cast: Taapsee Pannu, Tahir Raj Bhasin, Dibyendu Bhattacharya

Streaming on: Netflix

Savi (Taapsee Pannu), the protagonist of Looop Lapeta, is driven by the same crises as in the original film. The very first scene informs us—and her—that she’s pregnant. Her boyfriend, Satya (Tahir Raj Bhasin), has lost a bag of money entrusted to him by local criminals. He has fifty minutes to complete the job; he’ll mostly die if he doesn’t. Desperate to bail him out, Savi makes the same run thrice—after each attempt, she’s magically returned to square one and has to begin again. The makers clearly see why this might lose some viewers. Hence, perhaps, the prefiguring in its title, and the planting of a parable from Indian myth.

Looop Lapeta is directed by Aakash Bhatia, who has a background in commercials and music videos. His feature film, likewise, gives the impression of a showreel. Cinematographer Yash Khanna and editor Priyank Prem Kumar go all out, incorporating match cuts, jump cuts, POVs, split-screens and all kinds of crazy flourishes. As Savi and Satya kiss in bed, the camera floats up with them; elsewhere, it twists in from the side. Almost every event gets caught from multiple perspectives. Aakash has the enthusiasm of a young Bejoy Nambiar—a comparison that, I hope, should also double as a warning.

When the pace decelerates, and the film eases up a bit, it creates a moment of beauty or interest. The couple’s flashbacks are lovingly rendered (credit, also, to Taapsee and Tahir’s easy chemistry). The plot doesn’t deviate so much from the original as introduce minor kinks and twists along the way. I remember Lola’s father as having a mistress—here, we get an equivalent character, but in love with a man. Gender reversal is hinted at in an earlier scene, Satya revealing coyly that he played Savitri, not Satyavan, in a school play.

A character of note is Victor, Satya’s boss, played by Dibyendu Bhattacharya. He drives around in a red vintage hardtop, attends AA meetings, and stuffs and marinates a turkey with paralyzing glee. Dibyendu always brings something extra to screen—would Dev D (2009), a film Looop Lapeta namechecks in one scene, be the same without him? There are other winners in the cast: Shreya Dhanwanthary, delivering a monologue as a perplexed bride, all but walks away with the film.

Released in 1998, Run Lola Run was dissected heavily for its philosophical themes. The culture has largely dissipated now—and probably never really existed in India. What we understand, instead, is emotion. Underneath its bravura camera angles and endless flash, Looop Lapeta is a simple love story, and viewers will likely latch on to that. The film underlines this through its use of songs, which are winningly old-school and uncharacteristic. There’s even a raucous Qawwali number in the middle of a store heist. 

Savi, we learn, is a worrier; she carries her past with her. Given the emphasis on victory in Indian sports films—so many of them starring Taapsee—the realisation in Looop Lapeta hits home. Nothing’s that important. Chill, Savi, chill.