DIRECTOR: RATING:

Most of us love watching talent shows on telly and the reason is simple — they help make sense of our own challenging, annoying, out-of-whack lives. Those wondrous, intense moments, when a hall full of strangers rises in unison, acknowledging talent and applauding the grit of kids, women and men from small towns, from families without means, and yet making it against all odds are also the moments when we tell ourselves, “It’s not easy, but it is simple — stay the course and you’ll see that hard work and determination equal success and fame.”

That’s why we keep returning to witness those moments — the birth of a star, of zid winning, of determination high-fiving us — because it’s the best, briefest, most believable little episode from real life that reaffirms our faith in ourselves and our dreams.

Secret Superstar, written and directed by debutant Advait Chandan, is a fairly mediocre film that eagerly, diligently follows the oblivion-to-fame, struggle-to-success, rags-to-riches trajectory of its main character, much like those memorable contestants we’ve met on talent shows.

It taps into that very basic need to witness, acknowledge and celebrate human victory over life, and in that it’s exploitative, playing freely with our emotions and sentiments, and never really deploying intelligence or smarts.

Secret Superstar’s screenplay charts the course to victory on whimsy, with a generous dash of applesauce. That’s why the film dips often and requires the acting chops of Aamir Khan to add some spunk and excitement to its proceedings. But, that’s Secret Superstar in one part.

In the other, in the small choices it makes — of who its secret superstar is and where she comes from — it is absolutely brilliant. And it’s those small, political preferences which make this middling, ordinary film important.

There’s a reason, you know, the Supreme Court decided that the national anthem will play in our cinema halls before every film and not, say, at the start of the daily