DIRECTOR: Shashi Ranjan ACTORS: Shaad Randhawa, Shama Sikander
Iknow after a numbing experience, your mind tends to switch off.
But I tried to keep it active still. And I recommend this film only so
you can tell me what really was going on here. In one scene, one of
the lead actors of this film (Aarti Chhabria), you can observe, has a
red spot at the corner of her eye. You know she's suffering from
conjunctivitis, an epidemic that had broken out in Mumbai, possibly
around this film's shooting schedule. The film perhaps had to be
completed still, and that explains the actor's presence. A little
thereafter we see the girl in dark shades as she enters with her
friends (Sikander, Randhawa, Samir Dattani), all con-people to rob
from a don's (Anupam Kher) room while he's sleeping. One of the
characters asks the girl why she's wearing shades. This is so the
(sleeping) don can't recognise me, she says. That, I thought, was fair
improvisation in a movie that intends to be consistently nonsensical.
But nonsense is serious art. Crazy improvs occasionally work only when
there is just chemistry between the actors and the director (the sorts
of David Dhawan, Govinda comedies), otherwise brightly witty
screenplays (the likes of the rare Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro). This one
shares neither attribute. It doesn't help an entire film has been put
together on improvisations alone. So Mungi (or some such; Kher), a
don, you notice one moment, is shot at in a holi party. You learn
nothing of it later. The final scene, set in a 'don's conference',
abruptly shifts to a long sequence and characters that have absolutely
no relevance to the film so far. That supposedly was the climax. Of
the rest, from what I could vaguely decipher, Mungi wants to wrest
control of a territory from his rival (Gulshan Grover) because he
wants to build a hospital there. The head-don (Jackie Shroff) would
not allow the impotent Mungi to have his way, unless he can prove he
has an heir. He does have an heir, his sister's child called Kamal.
Except, he doesn't know where his long-lost sister or the child is
anymore. Three small-fry fraudsters — one girl, two guys — having
heard of this, land up at the don's doorstep, claiming to be Kamal.
The rest is mystery. From my past horrifying experiences, I intend
some day to send out an audience-advisory for films one should enter
with extreme care, knowing a few things about them. First, if the
movie involves dons any more; it's quite likely you're dealing with a
'crappola'. Second, if it's set in Bangkok (like this one), be
severely warned (it used to be London before; maybe that hasn't
changed either). Third of course, there is a comprehensive list of
actors in the principal cast that I'd like to send out, who make for
more than reasonable indicators to avoid a film (any film). The last
advice is of little relevance here, since the lead actors are
relatively unknown. They're surrounded by very many veterans. Each
goes about a terrible double-entendre or gay-gag lines which are past
their juvenility by now; the sorts where one or the other goes,
"Pategi" (for 'phategi'); 'Maa ki behen' as an expletive; "Meri baj
rahi hai, phone, that is"; "Teri choo… . ing gum", for you know what….
Oh, never mind; I'm the one getting carried away now. If the actors
aren't happy selling cheap, they make unfunny references to a
movie-title (Don, Main Hoon Na etc); or a movie-person (Ranvir Kapoor,
Rakhee Sawant, Mahesh Bhatt, even Madhur Bhandarkar, for God's sake);
or movies in general. You know the general literacy level around here,
and what the makers can claim their staple reading diet to be. The
protagonists play Lokhandwala 'struggling' actors and 'item' girls as
well. The ultimate irony is a scene where one of the characters, a
don's gay son, walks into a store to pick up a costume for a dancer in
his musical. But you haven't chosen the dancer yet, the don (Grover)
asks. The son says he's learnt it all from Bollywood, "The hero comes
before the film, tune before the lyrics." I want to know where this
film is coming from. It's been my obsession with bad flicks lately.
Ranjan's debut, Dobara (2004), if not quite a masterpiece, was a
tolerable road-movie about adult love. I just hit upon an interview
where the director says,"One day when I was sitting with a few friends
over drinks, one of them suggested, 'Why don't you make a whacky
film…" I hope they enjoyed the drinks. We're the ones with a hangover.
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