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Professor is still sadly languishing unseen; several of the actors in that one are present here) with Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron,Kundan Shah’s towering black comedy that redefined the genre: there’s a corrupt builder here too,and all sorts of other dodgy types. Sankat City stands on its own,even if it reminds you of Ek Chalis Ki Last Local and Johnny Gaddar: its characters are people on the margins,all scrambling to survive,and a vein of gleeful amorality runs through it.

Guru (Kay Kay Menon) steals cars. Ganpat (Dilip Prabhavalkar) remodels them. Sharafat (Shri Vallabh Vyas) sells them. Mona (Rimi Sen) is a girl on the make. Sikandar Khan (Chunky Pandey) is an actor who says ‘Inshaallah’ (do we know anybody like that?) and looks at himself in the mirror a lot.

The one that binds them all is mobster-cum-money lender Faujdar (Anupam Kher) who fills his atmospheric villain’s den with a muscle-bound bodyguard,a boy-lovin’ saffron-dhari religious guru (Veerendra Saxena),a cowed-down driver (Hemant Pandey),a going-for-broke producer (Manoj Pahwa),a lusty businessman who goes by the name of Gogi Kuckreja (Yashpal Sharma) and a contract killer called Suleman

Supari (Rahul Dev). This parade of pariahs crisscrosses paths and wits over a few days,and delivers unto us a film that is laugh-out-loud funny.

Only in a couple of patches,does the pace flatten. But the rest is rapid-fire action. Advani and his cast are clearly having a blast—keep an eye and ear out for Bollywood jokes,nods to the retro bad-movie classics of the ’80s. Rimi,the Bangla-spewing vixen with a softer side,is a revelation. And Anupam,channeling his Shimla roots,is absolutely first rate. Everyone else is very good too,except a curiously inert Chunky.

The smartest thing about the film is that it manages to get the tone just right—not too low-brow,nor too arty.

Shortchanged
Shortkut,The Con Begins
Jobless,hopeless actor Raju steals a superb script from sincere,hardworking writer Shekhar. A film is made. Raju turns into a superstar,Shekhar,a whingeing loser.

Shortkut suffers from director Neeraj Vora’s customary inability to infuse any newness or subtlety into a plot that could easily have gone the other way. It covers roughly the same ground as Zoya Akhtar’s Luck By Chance,minus its craft and skill. Everything is loud and plastic,and the actors all chant their lines at the top of their voices. Akshaye Khanna inhabits the same grid as he always has. Love interest Amrita Rao matches him,her unlimited cleavage not making up for limited range. And Arshad Warsi is the biggest disappointment,the highlight of his act being a crotch joke,when a champagne cork hits him in the nuts.

He’s been doing a string of low-budget horrors in which he’s been the best thing. Here he has no excuse-this is a big-budget,big banner film,with a fully-fleshed out role. Arshad Warsi,fine actor,RIP?

Take a hike instead
Morning Walk
How does an actor who delivers a cracking performance in one film switch to become a totally different person in another,both out the same day? Anupam Kher rocks it in Sankat City,but settles heavily like a rock in Morning Walk—there’s no lift,or zest to the way he plays his character.

Not that it would have helped the film any. It’s about a bad daughter-in-law (Diyva Datta) who promises to love her husband’s (Rajit Kapoor) father as long as he offers to invest in a new house. But it’s all gone as soon as Professor Joymohan (Anupam Kher) discovers a long-lost love (Sharmila Tagore),and a connection he never knew he had. The daughter-in-law turns into a shrew,the son withdraws into silence,and the chess-playing grand-daughter (Avika Gor,the child bride in TV series Balika Vadhu),is reduced to a pile of tears.

By rights,Arup Dutta’s should have been a touching family film. But it struggles to extricate itself from cliché and predictability,and fails.

Metal Mania
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen Revenge is a dish best served cold,not in cold metal. Yes machines which can transform themselves into gigantic beasts-and that doesn’t include mobiles of any kind— are amazing,spectacular,mindblowing and the works of a mind with a truly strange imagination,but do we really want to watch one set of them take on another while cursing and making wisecracks in true Hollywood tradition? For an energy source? Really?

To be sure,we were forewarned. When the first Transformers came,conquered and spawned yet new toys,we knew what was to follow would be bigger and more ambitious. At two and a half hours,travelling from American mainland to Shanghai and Diego Garcia,the depths of oceans to outer space,and ending up on Egypt’s

Pyramids,which by the way are almost ruined,Revenge of the Fallen involving Decepticons (just in case you forgot who is the bad guy) and Autobots,the US government and another unlikely alliance,certainly doesn’t lack in ambition.

What it also didn’t lack was a budget. From conjuring up those machines to having them in battle,to blowing up battleships and the Pyramids,and,of course,cars,lots of them,nowhere does director Michael Bay hold back. The most impressive though is a beautiful woman who turns out to have tongue of steel,a very long tongue,at a very wrong moment. Constantly on the run,Shia LaBeouf rarely pauses to turn on that boyish charm that worked so well for him in the first film. Megan Fox does her bit,getting by on few clothes and lots of pouting. Through countless blasts,her hair never loses its sheen. Can’t say the same for the film.

Cowards do survive,says someone at the end. So,unfortunately,does metal. And that means Transformers 3 isn’t too far into the future.

Metal Mania
The Proposal
Love born of strict business deals isn’t new to the film world,the one difference this time being it’s the woman who,as the boss,is dictating the agenda. And that’s about the only difference.

Never straying from the well-trodden paths of “two people forced together falling in love” stories,The Proposal has it all — one parent-less,the other with a devoted family,especially a doting grandmother who wouldn’t perhaps be as endearing in person; one uptight,the other carefree; one loner-struggler to the top,the other born rich but preferring to slug it out; one city-bred and toting designer luggage,the other brought up in a mansion next to a lake in pristine Alaska. Whenever the twain shall meet,love is sure to follow.

Anne Fletcher even fails to cash in on Sandra Bullock’s deftness with comedy,allowing her miserably few scenes where she breaks away from the cold,tough exterior of the top-notch,no-nonsense editor-in-chief of Golden Books,Margaret. To be fair to Bullock,in those few scenes,she demonstrates why she is so well liked.

Andrew (Ryan Reynolds) is her assistant,willing to accept everything she throws at him in the hope of becoming an editor one day. One day what she throws at him is an ultimatum to marry her as she needs to wed an American to prevent being deported back to her native Canada (she has been working on expired visa).