EMI - Bollywood Movie Review

Director: Saurabh Kabra
Cast: Sanjay Dutt, Urmila Matondkar, Arjun Rampal, Malaika Arora, Ashish Chowdhary, Neha Oberoi
Rating: **

You have to salute the Sanjay Dutt-Urmila Matondkar dinner on the dock in the second-half of this socially relevant in parts, emotionally elevating morality tale where Sanjay’s gloriously goofy and endearing character proposes to the object of his adoration.

The sequence shows great emotional control, comic timing and dramatic subtlety. It builds up splendidly into a spiral of implosive romance. And Urmila skilfully weaves coquettishness into contrivance to show how a lady can manipulate a man without meaning any harm.

The above sequence shows debutant director Saurabh Kabra’s control of the medium. Alas, this control isn’t evident everywhere. This valid tale about loan recovery scampers all over the place, quite like those poor debtors being chased by the loan sharks.

At a time when the world faces severe economic recession, “EMI” sounds a topical alarm bell. Tragically the narration doesn’t follow the golden rule of survival. It stumbles at times in trying to over-reach, moving the body of the plot into positions that damages the narration.

Miraculously every time the four set of characters stumble, director Kabra catches them and puts them back into place. You only wish the characters, lived-in and feeling rather than faking the emotions, would have been located into a more virile and vibrant environment.

Quite clearly Sanjay’s role, personality and performance are a carry-over from the ‘Munnabhai’ films.

The postures assumed by the plot don’t quite match the sincerity of the actors, all of whom perform with gusto.

Arjun Rampal and, surprisingly, Ashish Chaudhary lend a contagious verve to their parts without converting their characters into clownish caricatures. And a word for the seasoned Kulbhushan Kharbanda. Does he ever disappoint?

While the guys take over the show, Urmila and Malaika Arora provide the glamour. But Malaika’s item songs seem forced into the plot.

The sense of segmented satirical momentum is kept afloat through the performances. The dialogues by Nitin Raikwar and T. Govind Rajan capture the desperate energy and the underlining humour of a generation that’s rapidly losing the plot.

Blessedly, the film manages to stay on the right track. Never overwhelming in its social message on middle-class extravagance, but managing to make the ends meet from the beginning to the end.

Ek Vivaah... Aisa Bhi - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Sonu Sood, Eesha Koppikhar, Alok Nath, Smita Jaykar, Vishal Malhotra
Director: Kaushik Ghatak
Rating: * 1/2

Nobility as a quality in cinema seems almost the hallmark of Sooraj Barjatya’s cinema. Specially during these times of stress cynicism and violence, any film that doesn’t belch out venomous fumes is worthy of applause.

But wait. Before we cheer “Ek Vivaah… Aisa Bhi” for walking the straight and narrow road, let’s be warned. The route taken by the narration looks like a tepid and technically shoddy facsimile of Anil Ganguly’s “Tapasya”, which was produced by Barjatya, and more recently, the Barjatya-directed “Vivah” that won extra points for its elegant and fluent simplicity of narration.

Director Kaushik Ghatak takes us through Barjatya’s joint-family system. Yes, even the infamous ‘gaajar ka halwa’ (sweet dish made out of shredded carrot) makes its mouth-watering appearance during the first wedding that rolls out at the start.

Yup, the film begins and ends with elaborate weddings replete with the whole cast plus sundry junior artists dressed in garish pinks, mauves and greens prancing to the sound of festivities.

But somewhere this prolonged music-video ‘Vivaah…’ lacks the graceful zing of the other Shahid Kapur-Amrita Rao film two years ago which had enough meals and morning walks to make our digestive system feel balanced out.

“Ek Vivaah…” is lopsided in its fervent festivity. The first-half where a romance grows between two small town singers Sonu Sood and Eesha Koppikhar creaks with monotonous semi-classical songs.

The music composed by Ravindra Jain is simply awful. Jain had done the songs and music in the original film “Tapasya”. One still remembers Kishore Kumar’s theme song “Jo raah chuni tuney” with affection.

The songs and music in “Ek Vivaah… Aisa Bhi” are dreadfully dull. The film gets by on the strength of Bengali litterateur Ashapurna Devi’s powerful story of a self-willed woman who sacrifices marriage to look after her siblings.

Parts of the second-half capture the emotional aroma of the original story. Specially effective is the relationship between the spinster and her devoted soulmate who refuses to marry any other girl.

Suchitra Sen and Ashok Kumar shared a similar platonic rapport in Asit Sen’s “Mamta”. And so did Raakhee Gulzar and Parikshit Sahni in “Tapasya”. They had the spirit.

Eesha and Sonu are sincere, but they lack the gravity and ingrained wisdom and dignity required to portray lives that go beyond self interest.

What works for this “Vivaah…” is its intrinsic integrity. At a time when everyone is making films that either go for the guffaw or head for the libido, here’s a film that tackles very basic traditional values and the feelings underlining the colourful festivities related to the Hindu wedding. The language is often so old fashioned that it borders on the archaic.

But at least nobody is acting oversmart.

Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! - Bollywood Movie Review

Director: Dibakar Banerjee
Cast: Abhay Deol, Paresh Rawal, Neetu Chandra
Rating: ***

This is one helluva film about a lucky thief named Lucky who nonchalantly enters Delhi’s well-to-do homes, picks up television sets and sound systems, and walks out in broad daylight.

“Oye Lucky…” is a sly, shimmering mirror of a dysfunctional society always craving for more… not knowing where the greed to be upwardly mobile finally ends.

You could look for parallels to Banerjee’s aggressively-original vision in crime capers ranging from Arthur Penn’s Bonnie & Clyde to Shaad Ali’s “Bunty Aur Babli”. You may also discern enchanting elements from the quirky crime capers of Quentin Tarantino and the Coen Brothers in the relationship between thief Abhay Deol and his mentor Paresh Rawal.

But finally the all-consuming impulses of the Indian middle-class, their craving to be seen on television and their desire to be heard above the daily din is used really well by Bannerje.

The narration is miraculously liberated from the claustrophobia of middle-class ambitions to take us on a joyous bumpy caper ride. Not for a second do we feel the weight of the morality tale that lurks under the crowded front of the middleclass need and greed.

Delhi’s lower middle-class suburbs are used to create a famished environment for our adolescent hero Lucky to be born in a state of abject wanting and craving. By the time Lucky grows up, so does the narrative.

Director Banerjee steers diametrically away from the format he adopted in his first film “Khosla Ka Ghosla”. There’s no room for patience or explanations here.

The director cleverly and wisely reserves all judgement. Lucky’s life on the run is neither glamorous nor too much fun. Nor is it squalid. This detachment from the scenes of the crime is what sets “Oye Lucky…” apart from other crime capers.

Then there’s the casting. Faces that you might or might not have seen before blend into the bristling brew of laughter, lies and betrayal. Take the girl who plays Neetu Chandra’s embittered, excitable sister. She can be anybody or nobody and therefore special to the requirement of the film about trying to stand out in a crowd.

Archana Puransingh and Paresh Rawal as an unctuous Punjabi couple sweet-talking Lucky into investing for a restaurant project are great. Rawal in fact gives three wonderful performances as three different characters who play a part in shaping Lucky’s destiny.

Abhay Deol’s act is constantly laced with a streak of mean wickedness. He doesn’t act. He just lets his character be. Deol isn’t afraid of being embarrassed. Watch how he slobbers all over his kid-brother during a holiday with his girlfriend.

Neetu Chandra, superb earlier as the street hawker in Madhur Bhandarkar’s “Traffic Signal”, gets the point completely. She stays underplayed in an underwritten part.

The bigger picture clearly lies in the honest detailing in this tongue-in-cheek caper about coveting the good things of life.

“Oye Lucky…” gets savagely funny at times. Check out the sequence where Lucky tows a stolen television into a wayward politician’s son’s home, only to find every large corner occupied by television sets.

Look closely into “Oye Lucky…” and you can see where our society took the wrong turn.

Dostana - Bollywood Movie Review

Director: Tarun Mansukhani
Cast: Abhishek Bachchan, John Abraham, Priyanka Chopra, Kirron Kher, Boman Irani
Rating: **1/2

Get this straight. Abhishek Bachchan and John Abraham are not gay. They are just happy pretending to be bed partners. In the endeavour, they pull out all stops and get into the gay zone with a gusto that stumps all moralists.

There are butt-and-bum jokes galore, some even pointed at the leading lady. But hold that frown. Chill…It’s all for fun.

The theme of heterosexual characters pretending to be gay to get a precious abode in the bustle of the metropolis is pretty cool.

Abhishek and John, both in full form, get into the gay groove without going over the top. They come out with flying colours through most of the material that’s provided to them to sink their teeth into. While John combines terrific body language with some great comic timing, Abhishek’s expressions are a scream in their pitch-perfection.

One of the most brilliantly-written sequences orchestrates all the characters of this gay-play in the same room. There’re the play-acting gay protagonists, a gay magazine editor (Boman Irani), a gay marriage-bureau official and of course Abhishek’s homophobic mother (Kirron Kher) who screams and rants and then accepts her son’s apparent sexual preference.

You could simply marvel at the two principal actors giving so much of heart to their parts.

After a point you’re tempted to stop counting the number of times the word ‘gay’ gets in the way of the narrative. From ‘Mera beta gay hai’, courtesy Kirron Kher, to a ‘Han main gay hoon’, “Dostana” wins the how-to-say-gay-in-every-which-way award of the year.

Sandwiched between the two brilliantly-poised heroes is Priyanka Chopra, glowing like a 1,000-watt bulb in her immaculate wardrobe and beachwear.

So here’s the bottom line. Hindi cinema finally comes out of the closet.

The characters get ample chance to extend the parameters of conventional cinema without toppling into the abyss of overstatement.

First-time writer-director Tarun Mansukhani has the zing thing in his vision. Miami, shot with fetching gusto by Aynanka Bose, lifts the luscious locales to more than a tourist paradise. The desi characters seem to belong to this beachside paradise.

Well-toned bodies tanned to perfection, sinewy movements on the beach and on the dance floor, songs, music and feverish fiesta of sexually-driven people who want it all. And fast. “Dostana” is the ultimate hedonists’ dream.

The narrative pace slackens considerably in the second-half, what with the heroes expanding their homosexual hijinks into a triangle with Priyanka thrown in for good measure. Then the triangle dilates into a quadrangle as Bobby Deol makes a belated appearance as the boss who first intimidates and irritates the working girl into a motion of anger and submission. And then sweeps her off her feet.

Is this to keep the heterosexuals happy?

What keeps the narrative going is the sheer zest for life and the mood of wackiness which Shilpa Shetty sets at the outset with her ‘ooh-la-la’ item song. The gags involve everyone from the caricatured and spinsterish landlady to an incredibly clueless magazine editor (Bobby Deol), who agrees to behave like a moron at our pseudo-gay heroes say-so.

It’s all in fun. Not to be taken seriously. Not even when Abhishek and John lip-lock in mock-ecstasy for a farewell kiss that certainly leaves Priyanka breathless.

Yuvvraaj - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Salman Khan, Anil Kapoor, Zayed Khan, Katrina Kaif
Director: Subhash Ghai
Rating: ***

Subhash Ghai’s loveliest film in years has a symphonic texture, feel and movement to it. From the opening shots of Katrina Kaif labouring lusciously over the cello to the montage towards the end when Boman Irani, playing a zany surgeon, hops skips and jumps in the hospital corridor to announce the hero’s recovery, “Yuvvraaj” reworks old themes of family ties and unequal love matches to suit a new clientele.

It says it’s okay to want money. But it’s not okay to sacrifice family for funds. The palate is passionate. The look, feel and flavour of the presentation are near-exquisite. Ghai’s hard-earned reputation as a showman is on show here with shimmering austerity.

Less is constantly more in “Yuvvraaj”. The story of three wealthy brothers battling for the billions after their tycoon father’s death cannot be entirely exonerated of excesses. The supporting characters of ghoulish wealth - gold diggers and cleavage revealing sirens - seem straight out of Ghai’s “Ram Lakhan” and “Trimurti”.

But all said and done, there’s a delicacy to the narration that most cinema today is unable to achieve.

“Yuvvraaj” is not a film in a hurry. Though the pacing is even and stable, and feelings are frequently created out of the background score, it seldom gets cumbersome to watch.

Cinematographer Kabir Lal and art designer Oomang Kumar make sure our interest level in the incidents in the “Yuvvraaj” family never flags.

The performances are frequently charming and at times intriguing in their shadowy suggestions. The writer, played by Aushima Sawhney, flits in and out with stealth and grace, serving as both narrator and equaliser in this tumultuous tale of greed and redemption.

Bala, who plays autistic hero Anil Kapoor’s loyal friend, seldom speaks and remains an innocent mute spectator to the self-serving avarice of the rest of the characters.

After over-the-top performances in some hideous comedies, Anil is in full form as a psychologically impaired musical genius. The character’s vulnerability and lack of man-made manoeuvrings are expressed in the most tender and heart-melting expressions of a mind that doesn’t understand materialism and manipulation.

Anil holds the film and its loose ends together and serves as a reference point for this tale with a moral for our times.

Lower down the cast, Zayed Khan as Anil’s kid brother pumps in the right amount of hedonistic confusion into his spoilt rich brat’s act.

But clearly the stars of the show are A.R. Rahman’s music and Gulzar’s lyrics. Blending into the supremely mellow fabric of the characters’ chaotic inner worlds, the music blends symphonic elements into a big large epic desi sound.

Seamless in its splendid synthesis of feelings and sounds, and avoiding over-punctuation except in the Broadway-like choreography, “Yuvvraaj” catches the characters’ inner worlds in a state of reposeful grace.

The excesses, when they occur, are often doubly embarrassing because of the film’s continually fine structure and style. Often as the narration takes steep cultural swerves from Prague to Austria to London, Ghai puts in interior sequences on bad sets that intrude on the narration’s streamlined motivations.

Moments such as the one where Anil sings publicly for the first time are heartstopping in their sensitivity. But at times, Ghai loses grip over the narration, especially when some of the actors choose to do their own thing rather than remain in character.

But there is so much in “Yuvvraaj” to be thankful for. The splendour of the locales never overpowers the characters’ right to be where they are.

As in “Pardes” and “Yaadein”, Ghai questions joint-family values and the rapidly-changing equations in modern times. While pricking our collective conscience, “Yuvvraaj” rarely throws up a moment when we can’t look Ghai’s vision straight in the eye. It is among the finest films of 2008.

Dasvidaniya - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Vinay Pathak, Neha Dhupia, Ranvir Shorey, Sarita Joshi and Gaurav Gera
Director: Shashant Singh
Rating: ***

There’s something to be said about this sensitive slice-of-life cinema. And it’s this. You really can’t keep a good man down.

Returning to the ambit of the dull working-class protagonist that he almost patented in “Bheja Fry”, Vinay Pathak delivers yet another bravura performance as a man who learns to live only when he learns he has to die.

The premise done to death (pun intended) in films as disparate as Akira Kurosawa’s “Ikuru” and Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s “Anand”, gets its power and glory from the simple yet never simplistic narrative that grows on you piece by piece, just as the lessons of life creep up belatedly on our hero Amar Kaul (Vinay).

With every dying day he lives a little more of that life he leaves behind. Though the film’s leisurely pace doesn’t quite capture the urgency of the moment, “Dasvidaniya” scores high points for its sincerity of performance.

The narrative has been patterned prettily as a pastiche of 10 episodes, each dealing with a facet of Amar Kaul’s life that he would like to retrieve from the archives of angst and claim as his own before he’s gone.

The pace often drops to a willowy whisper. The tone gets predominantly stifled. The narration is constantly hushed, never rushed even as the shuffling, procrastinating hero speeds through things in his pending file that he needs done before he’s through with life.

The beauty and harmony of life’s essential core is obtained in passages of relaxed rumination and casual conversations that show us where we often go wrong in our daily dealings. This is done without wagging a disapproving finger at the audience.

Vinay gets the flavour of the tragic hero’s comic escapades just right. He’s partly Charlie Chaplin, and partly Robert Benigni. But finally this is an actor who does his own thing. Make no mistake about that.

Helping him in his endeavour are like-minded friends like Rajit Kapur, Neha Dhupia, Ranvir Shorey, Sarita Joshi and Gaurav Gera — all pitching in with transparently- sincere performances.

There is not one faked moment in “Dasvidaniya”. You may feel portions of the film - like the Kailash Kher number “Mumma” - are manipulative in their intentions. But that’s life. You win some. You lose most of it.

Kudos to Vinay for making another winner out of another incorrigible loser’s story.

Maharathi - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Paresh Rwal, Neha Dhupia, Boman Irani, Tara Sharma, Om Puri
Director: Shivam Nair
Rating: ***

“Maharathi” is based on Paresh Rawal’s Gujarati play of the same name. The play, a thriller, has been running for the last 21 years and has already had 700 shows so far.

Though Rawal himself is the director of the play, he backed out from taking the same responsibility for its movie version. So, in came Shivam Nair.

Since much of the drama in the movie takes place indoors, the effect of it is not the same on screen as it has been when played out on stage, so that the movie ends up giving a stuffy feeling.

It rises above the run-of-the-mill thriller primarily because of clever narration of the story designed to keep the audience guessing till the final denouement.

Adenwalla (Naseeruddin Shah), a film producer, who is past his glory days, is married to a young aspiring actress, Mallika (Neha Dhupia). Their married life is far from happy as Addenwalla, having fallen on bad days, takes to drinking heavily. Frustrated, he lives a wretched life and is loathed by his wife.

Subhash (Paresh Rawal), a struggling actor, one day saves Adenwalla from an accident. In gratitude, Adenwalla keeps him as his driver.

Though Mallika hates Subhash for his proximity to her husband, he later becomes her confidant when he gives in to her plan of getting her hand on Adenwalla’s Rs.240 million life insurance payout. Mallika also ropes in the family lawyer (Boman Irani) and the caretaker of the house (Tara Sharma) to execute her plan.

Even as they make their plans, the quartet quietly scheme to double-cross one another. Finally, their greed gets bared when Assistant Commissioner of Police Gokhale (Om Puri) has a whiff of it.

What makes the movie worth watching is that it has many plausible twists and turns, keeping the audience guessing where the plot will lead.

The restrained performances of the actors save it from going over the top. Naseeruddin Shah, as a drunkard, does not rave and rant.

Similarly, Paresh Rawal is not the usual liveried chauffeur seen in umpteen Bollywood movies who is ever so ready to genuflect before his boss and Neha Dhupia, mercifully, is not the fault-finding lady of the house who rides roughshod over whoever comes her way. In short, the cast behaves like normal human beings and not like caricatures.

However, the build up to the drama in the first half is long drawn out and it becomes a bit claustrophobic as everything takes places inside a house. Moreover, it is hard to believe that while Mallika and her cohorts plot and scheme against Adenwalla right before his eyes, he would not have an inkling of their intrigue.

But these minor faults are covered up by the believable performances of the cast and the twists and turns of the drama that keep the audience engaged.

Naseeruddin Shah’s performance, expectedly, is impeccable. Paresh Rawal and Boman Irani, of course, are a pleasure to watch, as usual. Om Puri and Tara Sharma have very little to do in the movie. They provide able support nevertheless.

The surprise of “Maharathi,” undoubtedly, is Neha Dhupia. As a ruthless, greedy housewife, she shows some spark of histrionics one never thought she was gifted with.

Dil Kabaddi - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Irrfan Khan, Soha Ali Khan, Rahul Bose, Rahul Khanna, Konkana Sen Sharma, Payal Rohatgi
Director: Anil Senior
Rating: **

This happens in many urban homes. But to say that extra-marital affair is only an urban phenomenon is wrong.

Anyway, “Dil Kabaddi” is about two young urban couples whose conjugal lives have gone a bit awry and they begin to look out to have some flings on the side to keep the flame burning.

Samit (Irrfan Khan) finds his wife Mita (Soha Ali Khan) has got too absorbed in the concept of conventional marriage and their married life has become a routine of sort, a life where there is no scope for thrill and passion, but one which is fraught with marital discord and acrimony.

So, Samit falls for Kaya (Payal Rohatgi), an aerobics instructor.

Rishi and Simi (Rahul Bose and Konkana Sen Sharma) are another disenchanted couple. But, unlike Mita, Simi is too passionately aggressive and possessive for Rishi’s penchant for a carefree life. To Rishi, marriage means togetherness, not bondage. So, he unintentionally gets drawn to a free-spirited student of his (debutante Saba Azad), but succumbs to her passion nonetheless.

Well, Simi, too, is not bound by the marital vow either. She has a crush on young journalist Veer (Rahul Khanna) even as she thinks he would make a perfect husband to her friend, Mita.

The plot however begins to meander, leaving the audience confused and in the maze of relationships everything gets blurred and it is difficult to ascertain who is loyal to whom.

Perhaps, that is what director Anil Senior has intended the movie to be: funny and puzzling. After all, even though marriages are believed to be made in heaven, the gods do not ensure happiness in marriage.

The movie is funny, but much of the fun-filled incidents are borrowed from Woody Allen’s rib-tickling mature movie “Husbands and Wives”. It is incoherent as there is no definite storyline. The fun emanates only from the forays of the characters and that is all about there is in the movie.

The only good thing about the movie is that it has a perfect cast, as all the lead actors fit the respective roles they play.

Irrfan Khan acts out his dalliance with his usual straight-faced style. Soha Ali Khan plays the role of a cantankerous wife without going overboard, Rahul Bose’s sensitivity comes across right in keeping with his role, but one only wishes Payal Rohtagi could have done with screaming in lower decibel.

Meerabai Not Out - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Mandira Bedi, Eijaz Khan, Anupam Kher, Mahesh Manjrekar and Anil Kumble
Director: Chandrakant Kulkarni
Rating: ***

What do you say about a comedy that brings cricketer Anil Kumble on screen only to go down with hiccups?

Every time cricket fan Meera Achrekar (Mandira Bedi) remembers her favourite cricketer, Kumble bursts into hefty hiccups. Just goes to show, you can take Guddi out of our films — but you can’t take our films out of Guddi.

Each time Mandira whines about being in love with cricket and cricketer Anil Kumble to the tycoon who falls in love with her (Eijaaz Khan), she reminds us of Jaya Bhaduri in Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s “Guddi”, so obsessed with movies and Dharmendra that she can’t think straight.

Meera can. If you want to play cricket, you have to think straight. To writer Soumik Sen’s credit, he gives Mandira a role to sink her teeth into. Experienced actor and cricket connoisseur that she is, Mandira gets into the groove with lip-smacking relish, abandoning lip gloss and hip-gyrations for rollicking sprints down Mumbai’s lanes with the boys of the colony.

Lamentably she isn’t required to play much cricket, just talk about it.

This either means that the screenwriter doesn’t endorse the zany image of Meerabai as a spunky iconoclast speeding around Mumbai’s crowded highway on a two-wheeler without gender care. Or it just means Mandira didn’t get time to practice her cricket on the field.

Be as it might, even the climactic cricket game in the chawl compound staged between Mandira’s beau and her brother (Mahesh Manjrekar) is perfunctory and more a snatch of a match to bring about the marital match than a breathless display of cricketing skills.

The prevalent mood of “Meerabai Not Out” is one of a plot not fully developed, and yet ripe enough to give out the appetizing aroma of a fruit on the way to ripening.

There is a lived-in flavour of a Marathi household with a harassed brother mumbling curses under his breath at the bus stop, a mother at home who worries constantly about the unmarried and cricket-smitten daughter in the house, a sister-in-law who thinks stealing an evening of paani-puri at the pavement is equivalent to domestic liberation and a well-to-do heart specialist who is so besotted by his cricketer girlfriend that he is willing to forgive her for everything including stealing away from their engagement function for a cricket match.

It doesn’t take too long for us to figure out that there’s more than a touch of Gurinder Chadha’s “Bend It Like Beckham in this instant sporty and sassy version of the inimitable Parminder Nagra’s gender-defying love of football in “Bend It Like Beckham”.

Parminder had Beckham, Mandira has Kumble. The cultural crossover is clever, though not fully realised. Often you feel the narration under-plays the conflict between what a girl does in life and what she should do. Just because it doesn’t want to stretch out its limbs.

Also, there’s the disturbing premise that finally Meera needs a man and in this case the man’s father (Anupam Kher) to see her dreams past the goal post.

As a desi version of “Bend It Like Beckham”, “Meerabai Not Out” is not bad at all. As a showcase for Mandira’s cricketing ambitions the narration brings her just about the best role she’s likely to get on the side of “Chak De! India”.

Golmaal Returns - Bollywood Movie Review

Cast: Ajay Devgan, Kareena Kapoor, Tusshar Kapoor, Anjana Sukhani, Arshad Warsi, Amrita Arora, Shreyas Talpade and Celina Jaitley
Director: Rohit Shetty
Rating: *

The sequel to the successful “Golmaal” is filled with in-house jokes - for instance when Ajay Devgan weaves the titles of his films into the dialogues. Or the hilarious takeoff by that talented Ashwini Kalsekar on Rani Mukerji’s randy tart’s act from Sanjay Bhansali’s “Saawariya”… it’s a rare moment of genuine laughter in this comedy of earsplitting guffaws, all emanating from the screen rather than out of it.

Fast, furious and fatuous “Golmaal Returns” isn’t quite that Diwali blues-chaser you expect it to be. The comic timing, though skilled, is wasted by the actors in sequences that try to breathe fire into a burnt-out oven.

No wonder the comicality is half-baked and often repetitive. The jokes from the first film are extended to the second, often with far-from-funny results. Many large sections of satire just lack attractive attire.

What was Kareena Kapoor doing in this corny concoction? Playing a fan of the saas-bahu serials, she’s named Ekta, as a homage to the soap queen Ekta Kapoor whose brother incidentally plays Kareena’s brother in the movie.

Tusshar Kapoor is a howl. And a whine. And a whoop. And a snivel. Since he is mute, he sharpens his ability to emote through jungle calls. He’s a revelation.

The camaraderie among the cast is quite evident. The male actors bond with gusto and Shreyas Talpade, who is the new recruit to the revelry, joins in without skipping a beat. His comic timing is delightfully sinewy.

But what happened to Arshad Warsi? His quick entry and exit as cop begins to get on the nerves after a while.

But Tusshar and Shreyas whip up a wacky humour. Most of the material about a suspicious wife and several red herrings strewn across a path that’s self-consciously forged on the grounds of Hyderabad’s Ramoji Film City is very old-fashioned in its approach to slapstick humour. Crowds hover around studio-built malls and streets trying to look casual.

They provide a rough and random backdrop to what’s basically material for a sex comedy on stage.

The characters run in breathlessly, say their jokey lines, fall over each other in rituals of suggestive laughter and then fall out of the frames waiting for the next gag to beckon them. It’s all supposed to be hilariously funny. But is often just a pretext for more a pantomime of parody than the real thing.

At the end there’s a threat for a third segment of “Golmaal”.

It would all depend on how much money the part two manages to bring in.

Going by the audiences’ riotous response, it seems no-brainers are eminently fashionable.