Tonight’s film - Deewana Mastana.
Raja (Anil Kapoor) and Ghafoor (Johnny Lever!!) sell black market tickets at the railway station. When they stumble across the chance for a big score, though, they take it, and flee to Mumbai 25 million rupees the richer.
At the airport, Raja catches sight of a mysterious woman (Juhi Chawla) and promptly falls in love. Ghafoor investigates, and discovers that she is Dr. Neha Kapoor, a psychiatrist. Naturally, the pair concoct a wacky scheme so that Raja can get close to her. They claim that Raja is a wealthy businessman from America, and that Ghafoor is his mentally ill driver. The plan works, but Raja isn’t as successful as he’d hoped; Neha is continually forced to break their dates in order to tend to her patients, especially the hyper-phobic Bunna (Govinda).
Neha takes a month off of work in order to attend her Uncle’s wedding, and leaves strict instructions to give her address to no one. Raja and Ghafoor and, seperately, Bunna manage to trick the receptionist into giving them the address, though, and they all head into the country after Neha. In the country, Raja and Bunna finally meet, and Bunna almost accidentally falls for Neha as well.
From this point on, the film takes on the rhythms of an old Warner Brothers cartoon; Raja and Bunna each attempt wacky overcomplicated schemes to get rid of the other, and the schemes universally backfire. Once again, we are in the realm of farce, and once again the comedy is pretty hit and miss. The physical gags translate pretty well, of course, but I had to use the imdb to work out a dialogue sequence where Raja and Bunna threaten each other while dropping the titles of several Govinda and Anil Kapoor films.
During all of this, Dr. Neha fades into the background. She’s important as the shared object of desire rather than for anything she herself does. This is unfortunate, since when given material to work with (like in Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hundustani) Juhi Chawla is really funny.
Johnny Lever, on the other hand, has more to do in this film than in any other movie I’ve seen him in; he certainly does more to move the plot along than Chawla gets to do. And he’s as good as . . . well, as good as Johnny Lever. Not a subtle actor, by any means, but the comedy is pretty broad throughout the film, so he’s right at home here. And I firmly believe that, like ninjas or monkeys, Johnny Lever makes every movie better just by appearing.
The songs are okay, but nothing really stands out as great. Most of the numbers are fantasy sequences, and the fantasies all take place in Switzerland for no adequately explained reason.
The end of the movie is by far my favorite part. I’ve mentioned in other reviews the practice of bringing in a big name star as a consolation prize once the romantic triangle of a film is resolved; something similar happens here, but it’s much, much better. For that matter, I was thrilled with the resolution of the romantic triangle; it wasn’t conventional romance by any means, but I wouldn’t want to see the film end in any other way.
Raja (Anil Kapoor) and Ghafoor (Johnny Lever!!) sell black market tickets at the railway station. When they stumble across the chance for a big score, though, they take it, and flee to Mumbai 25 million rupees the richer.
At the airport, Raja catches sight of a mysterious woman (Juhi Chawla) and promptly falls in love. Ghafoor investigates, and discovers that she is Dr. Neha Kapoor, a psychiatrist. Naturally, the pair concoct a wacky scheme so that Raja can get close to her. They claim that Raja is a wealthy businessman from America, and that Ghafoor is his mentally ill driver. The plan works, but Raja isn’t as successful as he’d hoped; Neha is continually forced to break their dates in order to tend to her patients, especially the hyper-phobic Bunna (Govinda).
Neha takes a month off of work in order to attend her Uncle’s wedding, and leaves strict instructions to give her address to no one. Raja and Ghafoor and, seperately, Bunna manage to trick the receptionist into giving them the address, though, and they all head into the country after Neha. In the country, Raja and Bunna finally meet, and Bunna almost accidentally falls for Neha as well.
From this point on, the film takes on the rhythms of an old Warner Brothers cartoon; Raja and Bunna each attempt wacky overcomplicated schemes to get rid of the other, and the schemes universally backfire. Once again, we are in the realm of farce, and once again the comedy is pretty hit and miss. The physical gags translate pretty well, of course, but I had to use the imdb to work out a dialogue sequence where Raja and Bunna threaten each other while dropping the titles of several Govinda and Anil Kapoor films.
During all of this, Dr. Neha fades into the background. She’s important as the shared object of desire rather than for anything she herself does. This is unfortunate, since when given material to work with (like in Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hundustani) Juhi Chawla is really funny.
Johnny Lever, on the other hand, has more to do in this film than in any other movie I’ve seen him in; he certainly does more to move the plot along than Chawla gets to do. And he’s as good as . . . well, as good as Johnny Lever. Not a subtle actor, by any means, but the comedy is pretty broad throughout the film, so he’s right at home here. And I firmly believe that, like ninjas or monkeys, Johnny Lever makes every movie better just by appearing.
The songs are okay, but nothing really stands out as great. Most of the numbers are fantasy sequences, and the fantasies all take place in Switzerland for no adequately explained reason.
The end of the movie is by far my favorite part. I’ve mentioned in other reviews the practice of bringing in a big name star as a consolation prize once the romantic triangle of a film is resolved; something similar happens here, but it’s much, much better. For that matter, I was thrilled with the resolution of the romantic triangle; it wasn’t conventional romance by any means, but I wouldn’t want to see the film end in any other way.
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