Chashme Baddoor Review

Sai Paranjpe's nuanced comedy classic gets the retrograde treatment from crass comedy specialist David Dhawan, This is an official remake but Sai Paranjpe, the director - scriptwriter of the original is not very happy that someone like David Dhawan whose cinematic bundle consists of mainly generic senseless comedies, has been entrusted with the task of revisiting her charming rib-tickler.

Sai's original, a revered classic - the remastered print of which is also releasing today was a film rooted in early  80's with a milieu typical to middle-class native urban twenty-something youth - A little naive and yet eager to score a hit with the opposite sex. Those days it was mainly liking someone and then if she agrees, get-set to tie the knot. Those were innocent times. Today the scenario is completely changed. You wouldn't find urban youth (middle-class or otherwise) wooing a girl and then rushing straight into matrimony.

Even the characters that inherit this squawky space are bimbos without soul. Deepti Naval and Faroque Shaikh  would never have fit into David Dhawan's schema of inveterate idiots who jump from one place to another for no rhyme or reason but to provide a cinematic cure for sore eyes.

Goa, which is the setting for most of this new-fangled flick, has little of its sun, sand or bucolic charm represented here. What you get instead are a couple of huge dilapidated washed out mansions standing-in for student PG abodes. The colour palette is extremely gaudy and the decor more bling than blah.

The three idiots are supposedly students -  Omi played by Divyendu Sharma and Jai played by Siddharth runaways from  some St Stephen's college  and the third Siddhartha( Ali Zafar), studying in Goa,  a quieter , more studious , straight-forward and naive version of the other two. We really don't get to know what they are studying or which year they are in. The set-up is a little convoluted here.

Gone are the cleverly put-together plot points of the original. There really is no room for sensitivity or sensibility in a David Dhawan comedy. So instead of charm and inner radiance you get a whole lot of physical routines, stupid antics and verbal pirouettes that sound too banal and ridiculous. Sure, they do bring in some laughs but it's not the qualifying kind. The characters all have a different profile thanks to scriptwriter Renuka.

But it's certainly not the refreshing kind. Seema (Tapsee Pannu) is no salwar clad ingenue , she has run away from a forced marriage and is residing with her military father's  civilian twin- Anupam Kher in a double-act and her  slap-happy grandmom played by Bharati Achrekar .

Omi takes first turn at wooing the girl, then it's Jai and finally Sid hits home only to get sidetracked by fake rewinds.  Then there's another forced twist where an older couple Joseph (Rishi Kapoor) a restaurateur and Josephine(Lillette Dubey), the land-lady, flirt at first-time love.

That sub-plot is an addition away from the original, which takes up a major portion of the second half, probably because there wasn't much to laugh about before it.

Frankly what Farooque, Deepti, Ravi Baswani, Rakesh Bedi, Leela Mishra, Saeed Jaffrey created together under Sai's deft and nimble direction was sheer magic. David Dhawan's rehash team prefers to adulterate the fun with over-the-top belligerence. Comedic timing has little importance when the helmer is most engaged in shifting scenarios rather than ensuring a palpable sense of fun.

David even has the temerity to shift the chamko detergent sequence which was the highlight of the   romance between Sai's chosen twosome to his add-on twosome.

Both Rishi and Lilette, though displaying immense charm and forbearance, look ridiculous playing out that sequence. Tapsee as Seema, is effusive but her chirpiness looks a little ill-conceived while Divyendu, Siddharth and Ali look pretty much stupid and ill-at-ease playing the fool.

Anupam Kher is also ill-used here. David Dhawan's effort is akin to converting a silk purse into a sow's ear. He may have engineered the crude laughs here but he certainly ain't gonna get much more than the front-benchers twittering in glee. Looks like Sai Paranjpe is all set to have the last laugh here!

Rating:  **1/2