A film meant for the masses, with emphasis on asses

KAMBAKKHT ISHQ - Movie Review

DIRECTOR: Sabbir Khan
ACTORS: Akshay Kumar, Kareena Kapoor, Aftab Shivdasani, Amrita Arora
RATING: **

As the gay community celebrates a long overdue judgement, Indian cinema too displays its special brand of “inclusiveness”. A week after the serious New York released, comes the totally ludicrous Kambakkht Ishq, which is set in good old Hollywood. While New York relied on logic and fact to grapple with new world terrorism and identity issues, Kambakkht Ishq bets on double entendres and buffoonery to grapple with the age-old battle of the sexes.

Kambakkht Ishq is what is called a masala film — an extravagant production filled with slapstick gags, furious action and music videos, wrapped around a size zero story, as befitting its lean mega stars. It’s a film meant for the masses, with emphasis on asses. The kind of film where the costume has more importance than the story — there’s nothing happening in this scene, so lets throw in some bikinis! The film credits four screenwriters, but clearly the producer has finally stitched the film together with parts picked from each one.

Kambakkht Ishq breaks new ground in “hip crassness”, which could well make it a hit. Starting with Akshay and Kareena, who expressively call each other Dog, and Bitch, followed by dialogues like, “Women are only good for two things” and “I will make sure she sleeps with me”. How cool. To induce humour, the film resorts to the worst clichés — amnesia, Viagra overdose and a set up date. The mood of the film is set during the first song, as Akshay’s sidekick keeps getting repeatedly slapped while he imagines women stripped down to their lingerie. Then Amrita Arora gets farted on her face. Later, a woman throws up on Aftab Shivdasani. A fat black woman shoves her fist up Akshay’s backside as he screams in pain. Not funny, dude, it’s just gross.

However if you like this kind of inane humour, then go for it. Akshay plays a stunt double working at Universal Studios in Hollywood, while Kareena is a surgeon and part-time model. Oh, that’s rich. Further, modelsurgeon Kareena is called Bebo, with a personal soundtrack which follows her around. Bebo mai bebo, dil mera le lo. Seriously. So anyway, Akshay randomly sleeps around while arrogant Kareena hates men, specially duplicates. One day Aftab Shivdasani, Akshay’s brother gets married to Amrita Arora, lingerie model and also Kareena’s friend. Akshay and Kareena square off in a battle of the sexes, and that’s the beginning and end of the story. The novelty factor in the film really kicks in when Kareena operates on Akshay and leaves her musical watch in his appendix. Oops. The watch plays a catchy tune, Om Mangalam Mangalam, leading to all kinds of stupid situations. A few, like the operation theatre scene, are hilarious.

In between all this nonsense, Brandon Routh, Denise Richards and Sylvester Stallone pop up. Denise looks old and wasted, while Stallone still commands a presence, specially in the elaborate Kodak theatre sequence. Vindu Dara Singh as the sidekick who keeps getting bashed up is stupidly goofy, but another trio of talent is just wasted.

Jaaved Jaffrey is once again acting in his own film, which has no connection to the main plot, while Kirron Kher is irritating as Dolly aunty, and Boman Irani comes in for a forced, wasted scene.

Kambakkht Ishq makes no pretensions to cinema, and sets out to be a entertainer. I hope it’s a hit — only when enough people see drivel like this, will they yearn for that special, different film. Hopefully.