For those who like that kind of stuff, this is yet another mindless film masquerading as a comedy. And all the hype yet again reveals something very slapstick, very ordinary. The first half is not so bad, if you don't mind a little slapstick and some very Punjabi humour. The second half just deteriorates into unnecessary weeping, melodrama and one implausible situation after another.
Its not without its moments though
the lingo is very rustic Punjabi and raises a lot of laughs. 'Chehra itna bhola, andar bam ka gola' or 'lady Bheem' were both delightful descriptors of Katrina. Names like Happy, Lucky and Mika cannot belong to any other community in the world. Pankaj Uddas, with his mournful, morbid stories, was a very nice touch. Javed Jaffri's removal of all guns from his person was funny. And the scene in the second half, involving Lucky Singh on a wheelchair being used as a waiter, was absolutely hilarious.
However, there was a tendency to degenerate into slapstick (the film begins with the oldest slapstick routine in the book with Akshay chasing a hen through the streets of his village), the situations become more and more flimsy and I really didn't understand the need to switch gears and become so emotional in the second half it absolutely ruined the whole film. Katrina & Neha looked lovely through the film, Akshay holds his own and most people acted decently, except Ranvir, who looks out of sorts and a bit miscast. The music is a split between the good (the title song and Jee Karda), the ugly (the Snoopy Dogg song and 'Talli hua') and the OK (most others), though all songs were forced into the film In some ways though, the movie is almost like an ad for Punjab and its delightful, over-sized, gregarious residents. I remember when a restaurant chain called 'Punjabi by Nature' opened up in Delhi and quickly established itself as an iconic Punjabi place with its vodka-shot Gol Gappa's, over-sized Naan's (pls never order 2) and tangy butter chicken. This movie has already, due to its title, established itself as an icon of all Sikh's and has been parodied / used and re-used in news channels, normal conversations, posters, SMS jokes etc. Its commercial success is almost assured. Pity though that the imaginative title and the lovely designer turban's was followed by something so trite, so ordinary. Surely the kingly Singh's of the world deserved better.
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