All Is Well

When will grown men wanting to urinate cease to be an acceptable gag in Bollywood comedies? From the evidence in this embarrassingly unfunny film, it looks unlikely for the foreseeable future. Mr. Bhalla (Rishi Kapoor) is a baker with a weak bladder. We know this as he keeps saying that he wants to ‘su su’ and bake, although we never see him doing any actual baking. Instead we are subjected to him verbally abusing and making fun of his teary wife (Supriya Pathak), who has Alzheimer’s disease. Cheema (Zeeshan Ayyub) is the local ‘goon’ who is threatening to take over the bakery. Enter Inder (Abhishek Bachchan), Bhalla’s estranged son who moves from Bangkok back to India in order to sort out his dad’s situation. Most masala movies come with the suggestion that you leave your brain at home – which is fine when the film in question is at least entertaining, rather than insulting. But nothing is well with this slipshod mess. Locations switch inexplicably from a Thai poolside to a picturesque Indian hill station. It’s apparently okay to laugh at people with mental illness. All Sikhs are jolly and wear the same design spectacles. An overweight auntyji lifts weights half her body size. Yet again there is a totally irrelevant dance ‘item’ number by a top heroine, and also an unforgivable reworking of a classic 80s track. Director Shukla takes ‘slapstick’ literally with the baddie instilling fear via his hand frequently. What’s hilarious is that Bollywood is still intent on churning out such trash as this and why a largely talented cast bothered.