That’s essentially the biggest problem with the new Nepali film Mero Valentine by Suraj Subba Nalbo (Batomuniko Phool, Saayad). For a story centred on the dynamics within a group of friends and the complications that crop up over the course of time, one just can’t feel the love here. Sure, we’re told over and over and over again how Lazima (Nisha Adhikari) and Blues (Baboo Bogati) are the very best of friends, as are Annie (Sushmita Dhakal) and Nirjal (Swotantra Pratap Shah). Now, Blues and Annie have been hooking up for a while now, so when Lazima finally decides to pair up with Nirjal, it’s double-date heaven for these relatively-young lovers. But even as they share meals and bedrooms, and romp around Chitwan hand-in-hand, the film never pulls inward enough to give us a chance to see  what—besides a common affection for impromptu song-and-dance—actually holds this particular foursome together. With the result that when tragedy eventually strikes, and misunderstandings conspire to pull them apart, we just don’t care all that much.

A major chunk of the blame goes to the kind of dialogues the actors are made to spout. I get that the writers were trying to make a case for hip, youthful banter, but the insistence on pushing English—when some of the actors are so clearly uncomfortable with the language—is a massive misfire and makes for very stilted, ineffectual scenes. Had the characters in Mero Valentine just been allowed to go back and forth in Nepali, I’m almost certain there’d have been more natural warmth and ease on display.

The actors aren’t entirely blameless, of course: Bogati is needlessly manic throughout, an over-the-top performance that can get on one’s nerves; Shah just strikes poses, completely devoid of expression for the most part; and Dhakal is a non-entity, barely making a ripple. Adhikari is a touch more substantial—she has to be, given that she occupies most of the frames here—but it’s an overall awkward fit; the actress really needs to pass up on these chirpy, cutesy roles and find her groove, and fast, before the hype surrounding her at present blows over, and it will.

Cinematography in Mero Valentine is nothing to write home about either; majority of the film has been shot in enclosed spaces so the visuals have a distinctly soap-opera-esque quality about them, which is just as well, given the soap-opera-esque nature of the proceedings themselves, including the score. The editing could certainly have been better accomplished to make quite a few very prolonged bits snappier. After a shaky first half, the film does pick up somewhat post-intermission—the high point being a rather lovely song by Shreya Sotang—and it’s a tolerable ride to the credits from there on. There is also an appreciable attempt made to touch upon—albeit very, very lightly—the subject of female sexuality, wherein the two women characters discuss feminine desire and sex in general with relative openness. Of course, that goodwill is squelched underfoot by the end of the film, but hey, better than nothing.

Scanty positives aside, however, it’s a challenge to find solid reasons to really recommend Mero Valentine—the film is a bit all over the place, concept-wise, performance-wise, and certainly with regard to technical execution. But I don’t really need to say too much; the mostly empty theatre that I watched the film in speaks for itself.