Nothing welcoming about this one

Nonika Singh

Behold these two morons, let loose in the film and in a way on us. One Shammi (Arshad Warsi) is a court-martialed Indian Naval officer and the other Kedar Patel (Jackky Bhagnani) is a son of a Gujarati businessman. The sample of their intelligence, sorry lack of it, manifests in the first few scenes. (Ah, only if the makers had reposed some faith in our IQ!)  

Together, al la Hollywood film  Dumb and Dumber , they find themselves cast ashore a Karachi beach and together their crazy capers are supposed to bring the house down. But as these dimwits take you from Jamnagar to Karachi what you get at best are some guffaws, one-liners that make you wince and situations that are singularly unfunny. Humour…you need a toothcomb to find it or have to be mentally challenged to go along with the writer and the director’s sense of it.

Welcome to the world of Karachi, ahem which our director thinks is Karachi—blasts everywhere, terror in every nook and corner and jihadis lurking all over. The picture that the film paints of Karachi with an ongoing refrain— this is Karachi, anything can happen here—is no different from the way many Indians conceive and perceive it. 

Mercifully, the film spares us jingoism. There is no anti-Pakistan rhetoric. Nor are Pakistanis shown as bad guys. Actually the bad ones too are not obsessed with destroying India. The film takes pains to suggest that much of Pakistan’s terror activities are directed at the US and even inwards. There are some well-meaning dialogues too like, ‘differences are big, not borders’. Only these come too late. In fact, the film takes its own sweet time to reference its context — that this side of the border or that we all are bound by humanity. Only by this time one is completely fed up with the inane tomfoolery of the duo caught in between terrorists, Americans, self-serving Pakistani politicians and more. So, even the few times that Warsi gets his comic timing right, leaves you cold. Ditto for Jackky who is in earnest but can’t salvage dad dearest Vashu Bhagnani’s film. One of the supposedly amusing scenes goes thus. Warsi in the garb of a doctor is kidnapped to deliver a child, and he does successfully with the help of a vacuum cleaner. Jacky quizzes, “From where did you learn to deliver a child?” Pat comes the reply—Raju Hirani. Ha, ha only the joke is on them. Wish the director had learnt how to master Hirani’s knack to tuck in humour with socially meaningful messages. Here, the message is lost in the two simpletons’ idiocy which too fails to tickle or tingle. Lauren Gottlieb’s jhatkas matkas in the song Shakira too can’t keep the sinking film afloat. By the way she plays a Pakistani intelligence officer whose investigative acumen is as limited as much else in the film.  

Those who have been offended by the song Lala lala lori sharab ki katrori and have filed a PIL, well the song should be the least of their worries. There is much more to take affront to, including a dialogue that plays with the word fakhr. Should Pakistan take offence? Well, every thinking intelligent person should. It certainly isn’t a welcome world. Find refuge elsewhere. Actually the song Chal bhaagh keeps reminding you all the time.