REVIEW 349: SINGH IS BLIING

Release date:	October 2, 2015
Director:	Prabhudheva
Cast: Language:	Akshay Kumar, Amy Jackson, Lara Dutta, Kay Kay Menon, Pradeep Rawat, Anil Mange, Arfi Lamba, Rati Agnihotri, Kunal Kapoor Hindi

The wisest thing to do when you make a film this silly is to flaunt your silliness with pride and not pretend to be anything else. Singh Is Bliing does precisely that.

And so, though it has the IQ of a boiled potato and a plot thinner than the slim heroine, the film gets by on the combined strength of its unabashedness, Akshay Kumar’s charisma and complete surrender to the madness of the plot, a supporting cast featuring excellent comedians – in particular Ms Lara Dutta – and situations that are funny, even if often cliched.

At the centre of it all is Raftaar Singh, an ironic choice of name since he is intellectually slow. Raftaar (Akshay) is a well-meaning buffoon in Punjab’s Bassi Pathanan village. He is spoilt by his mother (Rati Agnihotri) and constantly chided by his father for his inability to ever complete a given task. Desperate to reform him, Dad packs him off to Goa to work with an old friend.

A continent away in Romania, the villain Mark (a nicely evil Kay Kay Menon) misbehaves with Sara (Amy Jackson), daughter of a fellow arms dealer (Kunal Kapoor, yes Shashi Kapoor’s son – brief role, neat performance). Sara snubs Mark. She goes into hiding to save herself from the vengeful fellow, taking off for Goa where she hopes to also locate her estranged mother.

All this has been engineered to get Akshay and Amy into the same frame so they can sing, dance and fall in love. Along the way they encounter more villains, maa ka pyaar and endless khana-peena. The story – credited to Grazing Goat Pictures and not to an individual – is flimsy, but the film works because the narrative strings together one wacky comical episode after another.

Akshay is great with physical comedy, acting here not just with his face and voice, but with his entire body. Even in the supremely boring song Cinema dekhe mamma, his dance moves and gestures are a hoot. His willingness to make a fool of himself works well for Singh Is Bliing.

The 48-year-old oozes charm, which is a good thing because it would otherwise be impossible to accept a 54-year-old Rati playing his mother (biology is clearly not Prabhudheva’s strength). It’s also worth asking if the tremendously fit Akshay does not realise that he unwittingly emphasises his advancing years by playing the sweetheart of an actress 24 years his junior. It is a pity that his confidence in his stardom does not translate into acting with women his age.

Nevertheless, Akshay is one of this film’s biggest strengths. The other is Lara, who has been poorly served by Bollywood since she first entered films. Her penchant for comedy was evident in Housefull and even in the unsuccessful Jhoom Barabar Jhoom. Why doesn’t Hindi cinema have more to offer her? She is a riot in Singh Is Bliing, killing every scene in which she appears as Emily, an interpreter between Sara who can’t speak Hindi and Raftaar who doesn’t know English. Wish there was more of her in this film and in films in general.

Sara has very few dialogues, but the director makes up for that by letting her flying fists and agile limbs do the talking in scene after scene in which she bashes up bad guys. Good job, Amy! Quite unusually for Hindi cinema, far from seeking the hero’s protection, she protects him in one scene. The film also delivers a message – one that Akshay has been championing off screen too – that women must learn self-defence techniques. While it would be naïve to see this as an all-in-one solution, it is certainly one of many that could work together to end gender-related violence.

The positive messaging is a tiny step forward, since Akshay and Prabhu’s previous collaboration was the all-pervasively sexist, disturbingly misogynistic Rowdy Rathore. Not that Singh Is Bliing shrugs off sexism altogether. Disappointingly, the film features a stock joke about an overweight woman’s unsuitability for marriage and another about a woman with a blackened face.  

Singh Is Bliing’s songs are so-so, except for the hilarious Dil kare chu che in which the tune, lyrics, Akshay and wonderful Lara had me laughing so much that I got a stomach ache. Equally enjoyable is the later use of the song in the background score in a couple of juvenile scenes. Chu che is a fine example of intelligent stupidity – and no, that’s not a contradiction in terms.

All that being said, your ability to enjoy the film depends on your tolerance for Bollywood’s male-centricity and the industry’s Sikh cliche. Despite Amy’s fisticuffs and Lara’s talent, there is no question that Akshay is the centre of this universe. And though the jovial Sikh is a positive stereotype, it is exasperating that mainstream Hindi cinema refuses to portray members of the community as anything but jolly to the point of being OTT, breaking into Bhangra at the drop of a hat and/or deeply patriotic individuals waxing eloquent about nationalism and Sikh honour.

The world will perhaps end the day Bollywood delivers a grim, non-Bhangra-dancing, cowardly, unpatriotic, unfunny Sikh character. I wonder if the Sikh community will even want that. 

While we consider that question, there’s Singh Is Bliing. The name probably has some deep meaning in the minds of the film’s team, but to me all it is is an effort to remind us of Anees Bazmee’s Singh Is Kinng (2008) which remains one of Akshay’s biggest box-office successes till date. SIK was a more substantial, more memorable film. SIB’s lack of substance makes it forgettable, but while it lasts it is a pleasant, mostly harmless, rib-tickling, side-splitting affair.

Rating (out of five): **1/4

CBFC Rating (India):	U/A
Running time:	142 minutes

Photographs courtesy: 

(1) Poster & Chu che still: https://www.facebook.com/SIBTheFilm/

(2) Picture of Akshay & Prabhudheva: Sterling Communications

REVIEW 48: KUCCH LUV JAISAA

Release date:	May 27, 2011
Director:	Barnali Ray Shukla
Cast:	Shifaali Shah, Rahul Bose, Sumeet Raghvan, Guest appearances by Om Puri and Neetu Chandra

I have no idea how to review this film, because I’ve no idea what it was about. First, it shouldn’t have been called Kucch Luv Jaisaa. A more appropriate name would have been Kucch Film Jaisaa because ya, somebody went out there and cobbled together a cast, must have read something resembling a script to them, shot it and edited it down to a nearly two hour ‘film’. But what are they trying to say through it? Beats me!

Kucch Luv Jaisaa stars Shifaali Shah as Madhu, a rich bored educated home-maker in Mumbai whose life is even more dull than this film. She manages the house, gets taken for granted by her kids and hubby, until one day the dam bursts when he forgets her birthday. So she goes out and blows up some serious cash, buys a car and gets herself a glamorous makeover. At a small eatery she bumps into Raghav Passport (Rahul Bose), a crook who is on the run from the police. She is looking for some excitement, mistakes him for a detective, and asks if she can go along on his next assignment. He is still hurting from the betrayal by his girlfriend who gave him away to the police, and decides that some company won’t hurt. So off they go together.

This story of an unlikely friendship could have been something. But the writing is awkward, the situations unrealistic and the stodgy acting just makes it worse. It’s laughable to see Bose trying to do a tapori speaking the Mumbaiyya tongue in his deadpan style. The usually dependable Shah – who shows some spark in the early scenes – overdoes her effort to be cutesy and comes across in her interactions with the gangster as a ditsy dimwit. “Ooh paalak! Just look at the price!” she flutters at the sight of the leafy veggie in a store. Ooh, are you on a case? Ooh, will we actually follow the suspect all the way to wherever he goes? You mean all the way? Seriously, all the way? Yes, I’m not exaggerating – that’s how her dialogues go. Mr Reliable Sumeet Raghvan is clearly struggling with the lines dumped on him as he plays Madhu’s neglectful spouse Shravan. But by the end of it all, it’s hard to tell whether Madhu has actually fallen in love with Raghav or is just feeling bad for the guy, whether Raghav has fallen for her, and whether she likes / dislikes / loves / hates her husband.

With so much that’s wrong with the film, I guess there’s no point in dwelling on such things as continuity which has been treated as a minor matter by the production team. I couldn’t help but marvel at Madhu’s driving skills though. She’s got her hands firmly on the wheel of her car, and yet in one shot her hair is clipped back, in the next it’s flowing loosely around her face, in the next it’s pulled back again, in the next it’s falling on her shoulders, and the cycle continues.

The film is produced by the leading lady’s super-successful producer-director husband Vipul Shah (Singh is Kinng, Namastey London). A product this shoddy and a change in the spelling of her name are not what an actress of her caliber needs. The only thing I enjoyed about Kucch Luv Jaisaa is the prologue that plays out during the opening credits, showing us a newly married Madhu and Shravan who at first can’t get enough of each other till babies, her home routine and his work commitments eat into their relationship. What else? Well, the introduction to Raghav Passport includes Bose’s rippling biceps in silhouette. And? And nothing else!

Rating (out of five): 1/2

CBFC Rating:                       U/A without cuts

Running time:                        110 Minutes

Language:                              Hindi

Photograph courtesy: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/KucchLuvJaisaa