A big cast engaged in tons of bungling, glowering, scrambling and tomfoolery amidst twists and turns of madcap proportions, Anees Bazmee’s brand of entertainment is all for lack of restraint.
The excesses are for all to see in his upcoming Diwali release, Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3, the third film in the horror-comedy series and his second in the franchise kickstarted by the Priyadarshan-Akshay Kumar combo and taken forward by Bazmee and Kartik Aaryan.
The latest edition is going full throttle with its creeps and cackle, which marks the addition of Madhuri Dixit and re-entry of the OG Manjulika, Vidya Balan.
Anees Bazmee is no stranger to multi-starrers.
Sukanya Verma offers a lowdown on the man and his mad, mad, movies.
Naseeb
Believe it or not, Anees Bazmee began his film career as a teenaged Shatrughan Sinha in Manmohan Desai’s Naseeb.
See that smiley-faced young man with hair as big as his tie in the picture? Yes, that’s him.
Guess the masala bug hit him hard while working on the lost and found multistarrer.
Bazmee went on to assist Raj Kapoor on Prem Rog and wrote several David Dhawan entertainers like Swarg, Bol Radha Bol, Aankhen, Raja Babu and Deewana Mastana before he decided he’s ready to call the shots with the Ajay Devgn-Kajol starrer, Hulchul.
Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2
Rebooting Bhool Bhulaiyaa wouldn’t be half as fun if not for Tabu’s twin sisters avatar that keeps the whole film and its crowd of comedians on its toes oscillating between cunning and creepy.
There’s Kartik Aaryan too flexing his comic chops in a Bazmee freaky farce that’s not only silly but knows it too.
Pagalpanti
What can one say about a movie where a song goes Dimaag Mat Lagana?
Pagalpanti‘s get rich quick schemes by duping a pair of dons led by a troika, of which one is the perennially unfunny John Abraham, doesn’t do much for the film’s fun quotient.
Unless it’s the unintentional kind.
Its My Life
A lacklustre remake of the Telugu romance Bommarillu, Its My Life starring Harman Baweja along with Genelia D’Souza — reprising her role from the original — took a long time to see the light of the day, opting for a OTT release in the end.
Mubarakan
Mubarakan stars two Arjun Kapoors, but it’s really just ‘chachu‘ Anil Kapoor along with Ratna Pathak Shah and Pavan Malhotra at the helm of every trick and treat in Mubarakan.
The troika provide heft and humour that makes the exasperating goof-ups more endurable than they deserve to be.
Welcome Back
Bazmee falls back on his bankable old-timers Anil Kapoor, Nana Patekar, Paresh Rawal as well as a humorous Dimple Kapadia for Welcome Back.
The fun bunch elevate its feeble farce doling out LOL wit in what is a definite improvement from his preceding mess.
Ready
Anees Bazmee’s remake of the Telugu hit piggybacks on Salman Khan’s superstar draw to dhinkchika its way to the box office.
Strictly for Sallu fans is the best you can say about this senseless mishmash of romance, action and comedy whose idea of substance is the actor’s rippling muscles
Thank You
Another one that goes directly to worst-of everyone associated career’s list, Thank You reiterates Bazmee’s love for seeing humour in adulterers.
Neither Irfan Khan’s talent nor Akshay Kumar’s charisma is enough to salvage this abomination.
No Problem
Akshaye Khanna in drag.
Bullets that tickle Anil Kapoor’s belly.
Ranjeet shows more hair than Kangana has brains in the movie.
Monkey, dogs, fish, no one is spared or make sense.
This one is besieged with problems.
Singh is Kinng
Akshay Kumar’s potential for comedy peaks around Singh is Kinng‘s puerile, playing for laughs humour.
Bazmee’s film though, juggling between farce and hot air, is dedicated to tomfoolery of the highest level.
Welcome
Anil Kapoor and Nana Patekar’s madcap antics and camaraderie as mafia brothers conned by the same girl run the show in Welcome.
Toss in a jittery Akshay Kumar and jumpy Paresh Rawal in its slapstick scenario and Bazmee is laughing all the way to the bank.
Sandwich
Bazmee’s recycled Saajan Chale Sasural stretches the bigamy joke too far and solely depends on its leading man’s famous comic chops to make a stale shtick work.
But the long-in-the-making Govinda-Raveena Tandon-Mahima Chaudhry is well past its sell-by date to oblige.
No Entry
Straying men and suspicious wives are the script and source of comic confusion in No Entry.
Most of Bazmee’s hokum is a droning exercise in highlighting this cliche until Anil Kapoor, Fardeen Khan and Salman Khan, in an extended cameo, come to the rescue in a truly amusing climax.
Deewangee
Bazmee attempts drama in a brazen copy of the Richard Gere-Edward Norton thriller Primal Fear, which pits Ajay Devgn and Akshaye Khanna as devil and his almost advocate amidst deadly deceit and obsessive love for Urmila Matondkar.
Deewangee earned praise for Khanna’s intensity and Devgn’s wicked U-turn.
Pyaar Toh Hona Hi Tha
A rip-off of the Hollywood rom-com French Kiss, Pyaar Toh Hona Hi Tha‘s lovey-dovey shenanigans do not score on originality but hugely benefited from Ajay Devgn-Kajol’s real-life attraction as they embodied Pyaar Toh Hona Hi Tha‘s inevitability to the hilt.
Hulchul
Best remembered for kicking off a romance between its leads Ajay Devgn and Kajol, Hulchul‘s stereotypical masala about a cop and his two sons, of which one is adopted and the melodrama it ensues in when one of them is convicted for murder.
