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At any age anything fresh is good and at my age a reminder of how things were is better. So that is how the movie starts with a “Company” which is seems promising. Badmash, well, ok, so be it. We are initiated with the things that were. Good old Doordarshan, parental pressure to excel in studies (so what’s new?), rickety auto rickshaws, the lure of everything foreign. A group of friends decide to be carriers for a sleazy smuggler who darlings everyone. One off trip to the South East (when things were cheaper there) gives them adequate moolah and a temptation for more.
While the rest of the crowd is your average Johnny wanna make more money, our hero who is the classic topper of the college has his head swinging with dreams of riches. Anupam Kher has made a career out of his performances of the do gooder, middle class, never be secure, sermonizing father. He does no less here and succeeds in expelling his only son from his life. Not to be deterred the son embarks on plans which seem legal only on celluloid. While the background of the story is set in the Doordarshan era, the director conveniently switches gear to the reformation age of Dr Manmohan Singh who in one budgetary stroke throws a spanner in the spokes of our hero’s business. The phoenix needs to resurge and where else but in the land of everlasting opportunity (as well as the most incompetent- they get equal opportunities too). U S A.
The heroes of Bollywood rarely get to slog, so why should Shahid Kapoor. With SK’s beer swilling, chic ogling friends and an ever ready lover Uncle Sam hardly stands a chance. The first round always belongs to the risk takers and so it happens. Parmeet Sethi has obviously been following the stories of the global recession and the subprime crisis and ought to rewarded for using the subject for furthering the narration of his story where the hero takes a cue from the financial giants of the west and makes millions from repeated sales of an undervalued property. The easy millions and promise of more rip apart the bonds of the friends. One goes the way of the Bacchus, the other for the fairer sex and hero with his delusions of grandeur banishes the love of his life.
Nemesis comes hard and after the statutory incarceration our man starts on the road to redemption. So where does that leave the viewer? The movie is entertaining for the non discerning viewer. There is no message but there is no in your face, oh its pure entertainment kind of stuff either. The essence of the story seems to have got lost in the presentation of the gloss of high life. The shades of gray of the characters are cool and the vivaciousness and independence of the female lead is cooler. There needed to be a greater balance in the strong characters portrayed and the events which overtake them. The director has faltered but only just. The hero takes off on a rebellious path only to end up pleasing his father in the end. Can’t we have a pure villainous hero please? A wicked smile in the final scene would be so much better that the mushy family reunions.
