A perfect Paki play
Mayank Shekhar
Film: Garam Masala
Director: Priyadarshan
Actors: Akshay Kumar, John Abraham, Paresh Rawal
Rating: **
I saw this film at what can be called a small-town theatre, with the junta that was instinctive, loud, and tribalistic in its response to on-screen shenanigans, and where you still cough up only Rs 50 to lounge (or not quite) on the plushest possible seats. Of course the theatre was in Mumbai (in its central suburb) and the moment I'd hear the loud guffaws, I'd sense a dj vu of the numerous Pakistani stage gagballs I'd see on crummy videos in the 80s.
It felt the same, not just because of the audience around, but the 'theatrical' set on the screen: basically a living room with three bedroom doors that open and shut intermittently as three women – who our lead man Akshay (comically timed to near perfection) is three-timing – get in and out of the door. Neither of them knows they're being had by the cassanova in question. And the point of it all is to have you in splits, courtesy catty dialogue, a hilarious cook (Rawal, top-rate as ever) who manages this crazy household, and the repetitive game of one-upmanship between the clown-cassanova and the pretender to his crown (Abraham).
All you needed was a boom mike at the centre of this stage from where Umar Sharieff could walk up and deliver gems.
Of course then, it doesn't quite matter who's doing why. Why are the protagonists' photographers in a fashion glossy called Garam Masala (perhaps to shoot a few music-videos with the hired models)? Why did one of them send in a fraud entry and win a press photo award? Why does Akshay's Mac want to make out with three air-headed airhostesses, promising to get married to all of them, while his fianc weeps at home?
What matters is if the goofy, mindless and repetitive yarns work. Well, they sometimes do, as much as Anees Bazmee's No Entry, though the film is nowhere close in its ambition or range of canvas. They only work about half as much as the comedy of confusion in the final laughathon sequence of Priyadarshan's last, Hulchul (2004), or the director's far better works Hungama (2003) or Hera Pheri (2000). This is at best prolific Priyan-meets-David-Dhawan, over what film traders call a "one non-stop schedule, quick flick".
RATING
* Fuh-get-about-it, ** Ho-hum!, *** Oh, not bad at all!, **** Too good!,
***** We're speechless
Mannat Har Khushi Paane Ki
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