Alternate Best Actor 1994: Shah Rukh Khan in Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa

Shah Rukh Khan did not receive an Oscar nomination for portraying Sunil in Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa.

 

Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa is a decent enough rom com musical about a day dreamer musician and naturally the woman he wants to woo.

Shah Rukh Khan plays the ne're-do-well "hero" who dreams of marrying the woman he loves Anna (Suchitra Krishnamoorthi) though really without much of an honest plan. Khan here has the requisite qualities for such a role as the loafer romantic. This being a charm and eagerness that ensures likability while it would be quite easy to dislike his character without those qualities. Khan brings the needed goofy sort of energy though to his portrayal. This throwing himself head first into the musical numbers with a lot needed cheer and just in general finding the right sort affable qualities of the character. This even in presenting the character's dreaming with the right sort of sloppy optimism. There's a distinct lack of thought in Khan's reactions that are kind of needed in portraying the man who really doesn't have any real plan to achieve his goals, but rather thinks he can just sort of dance his way into her heart. Khan's natural charisma carries us past really the more despicable elements about this, and properly sets us up for buying into his foolhardy endeavor. 

His endeavor that is indeed that. A method most questionable as so many a romantic "hero" goes about engaging in deception to win his love, here in sabotaging Anna's own suitor. Although unlike many he actually gets called out for his nonsense. Khan's good though in showing really the honest spirit behind the actions in presenting the pretty straight sense of love in his eyes in the moment though while also not hiding the emotionally shallow manner in which he decries her suitor and lies as boldface as possible. In the latter though he ease nicely by playing it with frankly enough, well stupidity, to present the right kind of naivety in the deception. This as Khan makes it the actions less of a master manipulator and far more so a sloppy fool with a bad plan. This as though Sunil is rejected for this approach and kicked out of his band, as Anna and the other suitor was a fellow member of it.. Only being able to rejoin through the old fashion musical rescue during a  disastrous performance, however still leaves him as the unloved one. Khan's genuinely moving though in the moments of reflect on his state of sadness just showing the blunt heartbreak of it all, fitting for an overt romantic such as Sunil. Although I do think this film suffers from the flaws of many of this ilk, that being it is overlong, but Khan's work is consistently winning in portraying the transference from the petulant romantic to a more mature one as the story goes on. This as not following traditional expectations Sunil isn't meant for his intended love after all. Khan is effective in showing the maturity even within still keeping that energetic charm. This as his reactions convey more so an understanding of really all those around him rather than that singular focus upon his sole goal. Khan's work finds the gradual increase in really the nuance in the character while importantly losing none of his charm. This in emphasizing really that sense of real introspection and empathy that ends up being rather moving. This as he manages to express the action of someone blindly in love, then later truly in love. In earlier aspect Khan being a properly endearing fool, then later a heartbroken, but honest man.