Cast – Akshay Kumar, Riteish Deshmukh, Deepika Padukone, Lara Dutta, Arjun Rampal, Boman Irani, Jiah Khan, Chunky Pandey
Direction – Sajid Khan
Akshay Kumar, depressed with his life, swims for a very long time, until he gets tired and tries to commit suicide by drowning himself. Deepika Padukone, just like Clint Eastwood in Spaghetti Western films, comes out of nowhere, lifts him up and carries him towards the shore that is some miles away. And we call Akshay Kumar a Khiladi!!!!
The film starts with the most hilarious disclaimer of the decade. Sajid Khan mentions the names of 5 very important directors in Bollywood who have influenced him to direct films. And that includes Hrishikesh Mukherjee. Heyy babyy and Hrishikesh Mukherjee? HouseFull and Hrishikesh Mukherjee? Ohhhh, that was joke as the film is supposed to be a comedy. Such is the humor in the film that you yourself would need to find out the humorous moments if you want to laugh as the film hardly is humorous.
This is hardly an Akshay Kumar kind of comedy. If you want to watch Akshay Kumar kind of comedy, I think you are better off watching Jaane Kahaan Se Aayi Hai. He manages to make you laugh more in his two and half minutes special appearance than this two and half hours long film. Being a fan of his comic timings and his work in films like Mr. and Mrs Khiladi, Garam Masala, Bhool Bhulaiya, this one surely is a disappointment. The film mainly belongs to the ‘Timepass’ genre films which Sajid or Farah makes. While Farah tries to spoof The Matrix, Karz, Madhumati, Youtube videos in her films and manages to get some laughs, Sajid Khan straightaway copies them with no intention of even spoofing if he can’t get original. He plays the game of wife swapping in the film, something we just saw 6 months ago in All The Best. The game is not even half as funny in Housefull as in All The Best.
Five years ago, filmmakers in India started to feel that a film that does not have the King Khan has to have an item song to make it a hit. The latest trend in ‘Timepass-Filmmaking’ says a film has to have some gay humor in it. Housefull tries having both of them. And since it is a Sajid Khan film, he does not even try putting in efforts in the item song. Instead he simply took up an old Bollywood hit number and remixed it. Though it is wonderfully sung song by Mika, IMO, who manages to keep the craziness alive in the song, the video is very disappointing, thanks to the Arjun Rampal. For most of the film Arjun Rampal plays an angry man with one expression on his face, and for once he was asked to enjoy and he ends up ruining a song, How can one fail to get the right expressions in that song? It should have come out naturally given that song is so crazy. The video really missed the craziness I was expecting it to have.
Chetan Bhagat novels have the lead character as a loser who ends up having a girlfriend. Akshay Kumar plays a even bigger loser in the film, who carries a background song saying “He is such a loser” along with him, and brings bad luck to everyone who comes within 10 meters of his range; and ends up visiting Macau, London, Italy, attends a party in Buckingham place, stayed in one of the biggest house in London, has a very good friend in Riteish Deshmukh and 3 girlfriends namely Maliaka Arora Khan, Jiah Khan and Deepika Padukone. God, make me a loser too (preferably even bigger)!!!But this is a comedy. And as I said you need to find the jokes in the film yourself, if you want to laugh, as it only has hidden or unintentional jokes placed by Sajid Khan. Another example is the ‘Brada’ scene. The scene has Akshay Kumar leaving the house of Riteish Deshmukh and Lara Dutta, after arranging the house that he made a mess of, and replaces the Brada (parrot) which went inside the vacuum cleaner and died with a new Brada(tiger). The humor again does not lie in a parrot being replaced by a tiger or the scene, but the fact that he was leaving the house without even notifying Riteish and Lara that he has left a tiger.
For what actually was good in the film, I will have to start talking about Raavan and Raajneeti promos that were shown in the beginning. Apart from that, Chunky Pandey for once did entertain me in his extended special appearance. Though, he was sometimes irritating, but considering the other things in the film, his role and performance was better than the others. Lara Dutta and Riteish Deshmukh did act well, esp. in the ‘Brada’ scene. Boman Irani was wasted in this role. I agree with one of the critics (I think it was Raja Sen), that it is sad to see some fatherly figure like him to get slapped by younger actors. That is seriously not HRISHIKESH MUKHERJEE kind of humor!!! It was really sad to see him getting slapped in the film and play the role of Kanta Ben (Kal Ho Naa Ho) in the film. Lillete Dubey once more in her life plays the role of an old lustful woman. Deepika Padukone once again proves that she can’t act. So does Jiah Khan. While one of the songs copies the location of ‘Khuda Jaane’, the one with Jiah Khan is a mix of “Bebo Main Bebo” and “Yeh Mera Dil”.
The film has a watchable first half with a ‘Brada’ scene and Chunky Pandey act, and disappoints badly in the second half by having gay jokes, wife swapping act of All The Best and Arjun Rampal spoiling ‘Apni toh Jaise Taise’, and keeps going down to make climax the worst part of the film. I still have to find out the underlying humor planned by Sajid Khan in that scene. Was it Arjun Rampal winning an award for a brave soldier just like he won the National Award? Might Be. 🙂
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