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All the Best
NIKHAT KAZMI , TNN 15 October 2009, 06:53pm IST| Discuss | Bookmark/Share | Save | Text Size: | | |
Big brother Sanjay Dutt makes an unannounced visit to kid brother Fardeen Khan's house and mistakenly believes Bipasha Basu, instead of Mughda
Godse, to be his newfound bhabhi.
All the Best: Fun Begins (Comedy)
Cast: Ajay Devgn, Bipasha Basu, Sanjay Dutt, Fardeen Khan, Mughda Godse
Direction: Rohit Shetty
Duration: 2 hours 10 minutes
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All the Best: Fun Begins (Comedy)
Cast: Ajay Devgn, Bipasha Basu, Sanjay Dutt, Fardeen Khan, Mughda Godse
Direction: Rohit Shetty
Duration: 2 hours 10 minutes
Critic's Rating: ***
This doesn't augur well for Ajay Devgn, Fardeen's friend, who happens to be Bipasha's boyfriend. But the truth cannot be revealed because Sanjay Dutt's millions bankroll the down and out foursome. Ajay Devgn seems to be enjoying his newfound love for comedy, ever since he discovered his funny rib with the Golmaal series. Having already proved his forte with strong, sultry, on-the-boil simmering characters, the actor is trying to reinvent himself as Bollywood's new goofball. Seems to be working for, despite his non-joker (read flippant) looks, he does strike a chord with his bubble gum act, his sense of comic timing and his throwaway lines. All the Best, his home production, provides him an opportunity for an encore after the success of the Golmaal sequels. Of course, this time again, he returns with his Golmaal director, Rohit Shetty who has confessed his unbound fascination for the Manmohan Desai brand of cinema.
Manmohan Desai, did we say? Now that's a benchmark that's sure hard to meet. David Dhawan's been trying to measure up to the erstwhile comedy king's oeuvre for so long. But he has managed it only once with Coolie No 1. By and large, the brilliance and exuberance of films like Amar Akbar Anthony, Naseeb and Coolie remain untouched. All the Best doesn't even come close to any of the sparkling gems of milestone laugh riots. In fact, it begins so sluggishly you are almost ready to write it off. Understandably, the current comedy trend doesn't aspire to make any demands on your grey cells and we do not have a problem with that. But the first few reels of All the Best are hell bent on unleashing a complete dumbing down of plot, character, comedy. So much so, even the flowers that proliferate the screen -- the gardens, the bushes, the creepers, the ponds -- are artificial. But if you are patient enough to give the screwballs a bit of time, the goofiness does begin to crackle and the comedy does pick up, post the entry of Sanjay Dutt as the meddlesome big brother who takes a short detour to Goa, enroute to Lusoto with a jar of lime pickle.
Why Goa? Because his kid brother, Fardeen Khan, lives there with his girlfriend, Mughda Godse, in big brother's house, on big brother's pocket money that finances not only his dreams of becoming a rock star, but also helps friend Ajay Devgn along the way. Now Ajay Devgn is another archetypal beach bum who leaves the roti, kapda, makan concerns to better half, Bipasha, while he tinkers with his indigenous Formula 1 roadster. Bips meanwhile tries her best to make ends meet by running a decrepit gym with second hand treadmills.
And remains uncomplaining too. So where's the hitch? Big brother's unscheduled visit sends them all in a tizzy because he thinks Fardeen is married and mistakes Devgn's girlfriend, Bipasha to be chhota bhai's biwi. This is the beginning of a long soap opera that draws most of its laughs from a series of mistaken identities, where Bipasha must pose as devout bhabhi, Mughda must fit in as Devgn's girlfriend and both the strapping lads must learn to control their testosterone while big brother plays buffer between their better halves.
Events get more chaotic due to two other factors. First, there's the jhopad-patti turned lottery-winner (Sanjay Mishra making for most of the laughs) who is now the owner of Fardeen's house, but can't take possession because Sanjay Dutt clobbers him as soon as he dares to enter the portals. So he remains parked in a tempo with all his luggage, red trousers, et al, with his mantra of 'Just chill'. And second, there's a visitor from Lusoto who desperately needs the pickle jar and comes with a band of gun-toting Lusotons!
All the Best offers some rib-tickling moments, but mostly in the second half as the loose plot gradually gives way to complete mayhem and the characters begin to have fun on screen, specially Sanjay Dutt and Ajay Devgn.
Johnny Lever and Sanjay Mishra too join in the tamasha, while Fardeen and the girls mostly stand-by as bystanders. Pritam's music score is flashy and matches up to the carnival-like atmosphere of Goa and its beach parties. By far, this one's not a rip-roaring comedy, but does make-do for some Diwali masti.
Tum Se Tum Tak
Ganesh Kartikeya
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