JAI HO - SALMANS TRIED AND TESTED FORMULA Just returned home after watching what is being touted as one of the biggest Bollywood releases of 2014. And why not? After all it stars Salman Khan, one of the topmost stars of India and if a film has Sallu then the viewing public dont ask for much more, do they? The film is about an honest ex-Army officer named Jai Agnihotri. Jai has a doting mother who is very helpful particularly to damsels in distress. And why not? All she has to do is ring her obedient son and he arrives in no time to save the girl from more than 20 goons with the help of his two sidekicks who are present but it is Jai who is doing most of the kicking and punching. Jai beats the bad guys mercilessly and makes them wish that even eternal hell would be better than living in the same city as our hero. When the girl tries to thank him, all he wants from her in return is to do good to three other people and to ask those three people to do good to three other people each. Jyot se yot jalate chalo prem ki ganga bahate chalo. Then Jai goes and saves an abducted child and after that a girl who is forced to beg on the streets by her father. One after the other Jai keeps on saving people and passes on the message that he would want them to help three needy people in return. Te film moves on and you keep on wondering if it is not a film but a TV serial with many episodes linked together with Jai as the common thread. But this is indeed a Hindi film so how can Jai remain a bachelor for long? His mother is on the lookout for a girl to marry him and she is sure that unlike his sister Geeta (Tabu), who married a man of her own choice, Jai would never disobey her. But Jai is his own man and he falls in love with his sisters Gujju neighbours daughter Rinky (Daisy Shah). So one more essential ingredient of romance is inducted into the concoction. But Jai cannot keep on taking pangas aimlessly with everyone can he? So there has to be a motive to his madness. And what better motive in a Hindi film than a heros sister being molested by the villain? So Jais sister gets molested and our hero finally has a murderous mission in life. Then his nephew is abducted and Jais anger is further fuelled and he becomes a virtual killing machine. All hell breaks loose as Jai develops the combined powers of Superman, Batman, Spiderman and every other man you can think of. He goes on a violent rampage where he howls like a wolf, runs and jumps like a leopard and roars and kills like a tiger. Whats more, he even bites his enemies literally. By this time, one of his prominent enemies is the corrupt and wily home minister of the state, Dashrath Singh(Danny). But on his side is the honest Arvind Kejriwal type Chief Minister (Mohnish Behl), who believes in saving taxpayer money by avoiding personal security. Obviously Danny knows this and he actually goes and stabs the CM in his own home. This further boils Jais already boiling blood and he now wants to show Dashrath who the boss is. Finally good triumphs over evil and Jai leaves us on a promising note - that if Jai Ho becomes as big a hit as he is anticipating then we are in for many more sequels. Someone asked me, what did you think about the movie. I replied - I do not think when I watch Salman Khans movies. The film has everything that one would expect from a Salman Khan film - action, bravado, violence, good vs evil and even the mandatory scene where the villain first takes off his own shirt and then tears off Sallus. In the US or Europe, such a man would be sued for molestation but In Salman Khans movies it is an accepted tradition. All the film lacks is a credible story. And unlike some recent Salman starrers where the music was a hit, this one does not have a single memorable song. And yes, this dal-like Sallu staple also falls short on the tadka - the breezy dialogues that Salman mouths with such elan in many films. Here the dialogue writer was content with providing time-worn dada-dadi ke time wala cliches and did not coin a single catchy one-liner for Sallu bhai, which is indeed sad. That Jai Ho will join the 100 crore club within a week is a foregone conclusion but the big question is, with a hackneyed plot, with less than imaginative direction, with action sequences that are hardly innovative or breathtaking and with music that is not chartbursting, will Jai Ho reach the dizzying heights scaled by Chennai Express, Krrish 3 and Dhoom 3 in 2013 or will it turn out to be an also ran Salman film?
Posted on: Wed, 22 Jan 2014 22:21:04 +0000
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