There’s a joke among Marathi movie fans that the legendary actor Dada Kondke discovered AI way before anyone else. After all, Kondke always invoked his “aai”, his mother, in every one of his films.

AI and aai are present in Kshitij Patwardhan’s Uttar too. A prolific screenwriter, Patwardhan has made his directorial debut on the question of whether machine learning can supplant human emotion.

Unlike the Kondke comedies, Uttar is a serious affair. All India Radio announcer Uma (Renuka Shahane) has eyes at the back of her head. This recognisable mom knows what her son Ninad (Abhinay Berde) is up to even before he does. A single parent, Uma worries all the time about Ninad, who has barely overcome a childhood trauma and has a tendency to disappear into his headphones.

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Ninad is too busy with an artificial intelligence project at college to notice his mother’s sacrifice, or the sparks flying between him and his childhood friend Kshipra (Hruta Durgule). When a crisis affects the two-person family unit, Uma has her sister Shanta (Nirrmitee Sawant) to lean on. Ninad, who is confident to the extent of coming off as obnoxious and self-centred to the point of being lonely, has nobody.

My mom is the best dialogue writer in the world, Ninad observes. Patwardhan’s script too has many sharp insights into the younger generation’s tendency to internalise pain and overly rely on gadgets during a crisis. The dynamic between Uma and Ninad is poignant and humourous at times, giving both Renuka Shahane and Abhinay Berde several strong scenes. As Ninad’s mature friend, Hruta Durgule is a wonderful addition to the film.

While the mother-son relationship is always moving, pacing issues bog the film down. The central theme – the aai versus AI debate – emerges a bit too late into the narrative to be fully explored. The movie ends just as it is getting the most interesting, when Ninad realises that Uma is his north as well as the uttar, or answer, to his questions.

Uttar is slow to take off and a bit self-conscious at times. However, Patwardhan’s patience with his actors and his tendency to let scenes roll out in full does produce a fair share of moist-eyed moments.