Review: Thumbs up for laugh riot Dhamaal

SQUEAKY-CLEAN COMEDY: Dhamaal is a cleverly written film that moves briskly from one gag to another.

ibnlive.com is on mobile now. Read news, watch videos
be a Citizen Journalist. Log on to m.ibnlive.com NOW!

Top Headlines

Top Videos

Most Popular

• FM TUNES BUDGET FOR TAXPAYER, MKTS FACE THE MUSIC 

• Udayan's View: Budget 2009, a game of patience 

• A study in comparison: Education budget up Rs 7K cr 

• Face The Budget: Political response to Budget 2009-10 

• The verdict: CNN-IBN panelists rate Pranab's Budget  

• Reform hopes dashed, market watchers feel let down  

• I-T exemption limit raised | FBT rolled back | Taxes and you 

• Pranab skips two paras of Budget speech, apologises 

• Bengal benefits, Mamata and Pranab budget for their state 

• Income tax limits raised; farmers, exporters get sops 

• Watch: Dalal Street reacts to the Budget 

• Budget: Pranab's chance to create his own legacy 

• FM has done a fairly good job: Narayana Murthy 

• Budget to focus on social spend, growth 

• Education reform will be for all Indians: Sibal 

• The Budget That Isn't: Cyrus gears up for Budget 

• EVMs are tamper proof, says Election Commission 

• Watch: Railway exams disrupted in Mysore, Banglaore 

• Watch: Maneka writes to PM over threat to Varun's life 

• One-upmanship: Sonia, Pawar in foodgrain politics 

• Buy that big car: SUVs, petrol trucks to cost less 

• Life saving drugs, LCDs cheaper; Set-top-box costlier 

• Defence budget unchanged; Army gets lion's share 

• Minimum Rs 30 lakh needed to be called wealthy 

• TAX BREAKS, WELFARE SCHEMES IN COMMON MAN'S BUDGET 

• Common man gets a treat, over 15 schemes 

• Health budget up by Rs 4,000 cr, 6 new AIIMS in cities 

• Full text: Union Budget 2009 

• Bengal benefits, Mamata and Pranab budget for their state 

• Software industry gets tax benefits for one more yr 

Photogallery

Find us on Facebook | Join IBNLive community

Stay ahead with G-Talk Buddy | Click now!

Cast: Sanjay Dutt, Ritesh Deshmukh, Arshad Warsi, Javed Jaffrey

Direction: Indra Kumar

We've become so accustomed to vulgarity in the name of humour that we've forgotten to appreciate clean comedies. Which is why I want to roll out the carpet for this week's new Bollywood release, Dhamaal, a genuinely funny, plot-driven family comedy directed by - surprise, surprise - the king of melodrama himself, Indra Kumar.

The film stars Ritesh Deshmukh, Arshad Warsi, Javed Jaffrey and Ashish Chaudhary as a bunch of unemployed, down-on-their-luck no-gooders who go in search of a ten-crore rupee treasure they learn about from a dying mob-boss.

As luck would have it, the secret of this hidden treasure also reaches the ears of a crooked cop, played by Sanjay Dutt. So now you've got five guys heading in the direction of this stacked-away money, each encountering oddballs along the way, each trying to reach the location before the others so he can claim the full amount himself.

What's refreshing about Dhamaal is the fact that it doesn't fall into any of the traps that recent hits in the comic genre - Partner and Heyy Babyy succumbed to - it's not vulgar, it isn't full of sexist jokes, the dialogues aren't stupid, and you don't feel like the gags are being stretched out endlessly.

Having said that, let's not get too carried away and put either the director or the writers on a pedestal just yet, because Dhamaal is after all a rather blatant rip-off of the evergreen Hollywood hit, It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World.