Humshakals

Sajid Khan strikes back with his slap stick comedy genre with "Humshakals" but the problem is that there is not enough laughs to sustain 159 mins… So Sajid goes back to his "Housefull " mould of European mansions, swanky cars, heroines wearing skimpiest costumes and too many characters who are a caricature. Sadly for "Humshakals" it falls flat and what we get is a trash in the name of comedy.

The Story written by Sajid Khan of three sets of Humshakals of Ashok (Saif), Kumar (Riteish) and Mamaji alias KANS (Ram Kapoor), one set of Ashok who is heir to the multimillion empire of Sighanias, Kumar who is Ashok's best friend and Mamaji who is scheming to confiscate the empire from Ashok, another set wherein all three are mental patients Ashok, Kumar & Jhonny, and third set consists of Ashok and Kumar who are feminine by nature and Mamaji who is bar dance owner. CONFUSED well this just the beginning, Sajid thought that he could actually better Shakespeare's Comedy of Error but alas there is no story.

Screenplay should I say the lack of it credited to Robin Bhatt, Akash Khurana and Sajid Khan is just a shocker and imagination just goes wild. A sequence has a doctor giving a medicine potion which makes human beings act like DOGS and you see both Reteish & Saif acting like dogs well this is utterly insane in the name of comedy. The Dialogues by Sajid Khan and Adhir Bhatt is equally bad what with "Aap Meri Zindagi mein Aaye to Mere Bacche Ka Baap Ban Jaye"….

The performances by the ensemble cast is just too childish to laugh, for Saif I think this is his worst performance till date. Making faces does not suffice for acting and Saif is so bad when he is imitating actors. Reteish still gives you a few laughs but he could not salvage the mayhem around. Ram Kapoor looks completely lost all throughout the movie. Satish Shah as the warden hams all throughout. The actresses have no scope to act, they are there as eye candy wearing skimpiest clothes. I can still understand for Tamanah Bhatia and Esha Gupta who are relatively new and hence they did this film but why the hell did Bipasha Basu do this film she looks like a glorified extra in the movie.

The only good thing about the movie is the cinematography by Ravi Yadav which is good and catchy to the eye. Music by Himesh Reshamiya is extremely average, excluding "Caller Tune" none of the other songs are worth mentioning.

Sajid Khan's "Humshakals" has outdone Ram Gopal Varma's "Aag" in making Trash, and RGV's "Aag " looks like a classic in front of SK's "Humshakals". Sajid Khan has to relearn what is entertainment before venturing to his next project.

Hoped they had a 0 or even minus rating!!

Thankfully (or not) we had a 8 year old amidst us and as she was finding this movie quite a fun, we had a good time hearing her laugh and watching her rolling in the seat :-)

Otherwise, i assure u we would have had a stroke or would have to get ourselves admitted in Agra mental asylum ourselves!! My sympathies with guys who were not as lucky as us ....

Yes we had a few laughs because my friend had warned me it would be intolerable and our expectations were ... NONE whatsoever!!

That said,, what really struck me was the obvious fact in the movie that

THE WRITER AND DIRECTOR HAD MADE THIS MOVIE WITH A PRESUMPTION THAT Indian AUDIENCE HAS AN IQ OF AN 8 YEAR OLD!!!!

WHY ELSE DO ALL THE 'BIG BUDGET' movies like Chennai Express, Dubang 2 are made out to be as BRAINLESS as possible!!! THE DIRECTORS and producers who r investing millions are not totally idiots are they!

Lets face it--- a low level shameless Hollywood rip-off ( Krish, Dahomey 3) or a BRAINLESS comedy like ( Kolyma returns, house-full, Chennai express, Humshakals) MAKE BIG BUCKS IN THE BOX OFFICE than a meaningful one like queen, Dil Chahta Hai etc

And this brings us to an ugly truth conclusion that --

Just as 70% of India lives in villages, 90% of India's audience love low IQ / poor imitation movies which are usually racist/ show women as men's sex slaves or have non-veg jokes at the cost of homosexuals and others...

Akshay Kumar and SRK have very well understood this phenomenon and accordingly have changed the type of movies they sign up for. in the last ten years, they have hardly made any movie which has even an iota of meaning in it--

And yet they have gone on to become the richest of the lot!!!!

Akshay Kumar, after Herapheri success, suddenly resorted to such brainless comedies ..

SRK - it's hard to believe that a guy who has acted in Swades and My Name Is Khan ,, prefers to act in movies like Om Shanti Om and Chennai Express!!

Both siblings- Farah (with SRK's blessings) and Sajid have eagerly embraced this formula of BRAINLESS movies and unabashedly churn out such black-hole movies...

And unless the 90% Indian audience, Whose brain has been addled by Ekta Kapur soap operas, wake up from their stupor,, this is going to go on :-)

Mera Bharat Mahan!

Imagine ... and I mean try to 'visualize' what you are going to read next... "After having watched this movie in a cinema-hall, while on your way back (from it), a mad dog crosses your path. wait ... make it more ... let us say, three mad dogs. You are terrified, assuming that the dogs might bite you but. Somehow those dogs know that you have seen 'Humshakals' and that too in a 'hall'. So, instead of biting you they'll all bow down in front of you showing utter respect to the courage you exhibited!" ... I think you got the point. Why did these actors work in this movie. Why?? Certain scenes are quite funny but overall this movie is s**t.

Worst acting. Worst direction. Worst story line. Nothing is good about the movie except music. Thanks to Himesh for adding a plus point. Its not 9 time entertainer, it will give 9 time headache. Saif is the worst of all — he is unconvincing as the man behaving as a dog, as the waitress. Just about everything he does in the movie is like he's just sleep-walking. With no story or comedy on offer, even Riteish and Ram are unable to save the day for Sajid Khan. Skip this movie if you do not want a bad headache and other after-effects of being tortured.No start we can afford for this crap. There is no option to give 0 or -ve rating, it deserves this only. Among all the actors Saif is at worst. Even a Himmatwala cannot watch this.

Reviewed by: Dare Devil Kid (DDK)

Rating: 1.5/5 stars

Sajid Khan completely botches up what had the potential to be a rib- tickling situational comedy of errors. With premise reeking of comedy gold, on his hands, and with a trio of multi-talented male actors boasting of impeccable comic typing, only a complete twit could have ruined this movie. And what's more surprising is that Sajid Khan has been known to entertain audiences with his no-brainer, madcap, situational comedies. But, since "Himmatwala", he seems to have completely lost his mojo, or maybe he just had a limited supply of mojo that has now been exhausted over the course of his first three, laugh- out-loud, humorous adventures. In fact, there are several scenes reminiscent of his initial three hits, which seem to be mutilated into something else. The jokes fall flat, the gags are tiresome, and the exceedingly sparse amount of buildups that start out as funny, quickly swerve into painful territory because of Khan's hackneyed direction.

It's criminal that the Director has completely wasted three powerhouse performers in the form of Saif Ali Khan, Ritesh Deshmukh, and Ram Kapoor, and despite their umpteen attempts, the three talents simply cannot salvage the crumbling ruins around them. Even more shameful is the fact that Khan seems to explore new territories where he can turn his actors into mere caricatures of themselves – scenes where Saif and Ritesh act up as insane canines and Ram Kapoor masquerading as a woman are unbearable to the point of being cringe-worthy. Heck, he even dresses up Ram Kapoor in a one-piece bikini! Which normal human being with his senses in the right place would ever do that? It's not just moronic, it's unethical! The less said about how the actresses are blatantly underutilized through the slipshod, inane proceedings, the better.

"Humshakals" seems to have rung the death knell on Sajid Khan's directing career, and only a miracle would seem him emerge from the ashes he has smoldered himself into. On a parting note, there a scene in the movie where Satish Shah, who plays the totalitarian warden of an asylum ward (Shah takes pride and displays an overt love for some of history's most notorious dictators such as Hitler, Saddam, Amin, and Gadaffi – one instance among the film's many tasteless and insensitive jokes), tortures dissenting inmates by forcefully making them sit through a copy of Sajid Khan's own "Himmatwala". Well, suffice to say, Khan has even outdone himself this time as far as competing from behind goes.