Flat Note

CAST: Jackky Bhagnani,Nidhi Subbaih,Darshan Jariwala,

Kirron Kher,Arjun Rampal

*1/2

Rich brat falls for weird girl. Girl likes the poor,hates the rich. So what does rich brat do? Why,ask his diamond-dripping family to pretend that they are to poverty born.

This is not just a single-sequence joke in Ajab Gazabb Love,which features Jackky Bhagnani as rich boy,Nidhi as weird girl,Jariwala as rich boy’s loving daddyji,Kher as mummyji,and assorted bit part players. This is the whole film. Which could conceivably have been funny,and maybe that’s how it was conceived,but not like this,which plays out over two interminable hours.

Rich boy,whose father is an automobile tycoon,wants to make a ‘low cost’ luxury car. And how much would that be? Oh,just a paltry pacchees lakh. While he’s waiting for this to materialise,the plot leads us to a holiday on a beach with bikinied babes,which allows Bhagnani to prance on a yatch,bronzed chest to the fore. After this,it’s an open season: Jariwala is made to sell bananas,Kher to act blind and batty,and the rich family to stay in a kholi because that’s what the poor do,don’t they? Seriously,is this really from Sanjay Gadhvi,who gave us the kick-ass Dhoom flicks?

Bhagnani’s previous outing in Faltu,also produced by papa Vashu,was tolerable,because he was shrewd enough to not take himself seriously. Here he loses no time to get into the buff hero mode,and give himself songs-and-dances with his leading lady,and heavy emotional bits with family: it is Jariwala who makes the most of it,and walks off with the film,such as it is.

Despite all the foreign locations glitter,this plays out like a flat,meandering TV comedy. What is the ajab,and where’s the gazabb?

SG