Meet the unhappy family - Santosh Duggal (Rishi Kapoor),a Delhi schoolteacher who makes extra money from coaching classes,his wife Kusum (Neetu Kapoor),who is a homemaker because of her husbands wish,and two teenage kids,Sandip aka Sandy (Archit Krishna) and Payal (Aditi Vasudev). Provident Fund,Fixed Deposits,Household Expenses and Loan Installments form the staple chunk in their conversations,and Santoshs standard answer to his kids wanting anything is No,not possible. So far,so good - teachers are never paid what they should be,but guess we are social creatures first and all else later. Enter Santoshs brattish,overweight sister (Supriya Shukla) in whose sasural an important wedding is to happen in a nearby town. The lady is brazenly snobbish and would rather her brothers family not attend if they cannot come to the wedding in a car. A neighbours (Akhilendra Mishra) automobile is borrowed. However this act leads to a lot more losses for one reason or another and when the neighbours wife taunts Santosh about his inability to buy his own vehicle,the angry Santosh decides that he will do anything to get his own car - even if he cannot afford it. Then begins a fresh clash - daughter Payal cannot bear a small hatchback and wants a bigger vehicle,and Santosh tries to go that extra crooked mile against his grain. The film ends with nothing changing for the family other than his finally buying a small car and earning much more respect (from his own family and from others) for what he is - Mr. Honest. No one can deny the noble intentions of director-co-writer Habib Faisal,but his execution falls short of his aims. The narrative flip-flops between slice of life stuff and the completely absurd (like the sequence in the burger joint followed by the chase). The slice-of-life portions lack punch and the proceedings are a drag even for the two-hour length. The marriage sequences in the beginning end up completely distasteful from the point of the viewer - should not an honest teacher put his foot down about living beyond his means and indulging his pesky sister? During the long wedding sequences,Punjabi culture comes across as extremely regressive. Aarti Bajajs editing is erratic and the background music often cacophonous. Worse,the narrative device of the daughter recounting the story is a portent of what is to come - a weak script. How can she know of happenings in her brothers private life or about places and events where she was not even present? And somehow,as the characters go through the rigours of daily middle-class life and trysts with their conscience and values,we do not end up feeling sympathy or empathy for them. This is a film that is wannabe Hrishikesh Mukherjee-meets-Basu Chaterjee,but the target is missed by a mile. Rishi Kapoor delivers a consummate performance as always while Neetu Kapoor is average - which,when we consider her talent,is just not good enough. The scene-stealer is Aditi Vasudev as Payal. The technical values are decent,and Mukund Guptas art direction especially of the Delhi middle-class home gets full marks. Director Habib Faisal scores in the final sequences where the teachers virtues are extolled,but we wonder how a sweetmeat vendor who had come to bribe the teacher to pass his errant son in the tests had such a sudden change of heart. Somewhere it does not add up. And in the precise mathematics of quality filmmaking,two and two must make four,not two and a half. Rating: ** One star for the actors who play the Duggal family and one for the good intentions.
