A crowd pleaser is a film that induces seeti and taali from the audience, making sure they go back home feeling they’ve spent their money on something cheerful. One way to do this is to flesh out a story with an unusual conflict and resolve that conflict in ways that surprise the audience, while also shoehorning a social message into the film in the process. This is difficult to do and as a result, rare. Queen belonged to this rare breed of films.
Another way to make a crowd pleaser is to aim for the lowest common denominator, establish an unusual conflict and resolve it using unbelievable contrivances, while dishing out crackling dialogues, soap-opera style dramatic beats and social messages. Tanu Weds Manu Returns is one of these films.
