It never rains but it pours – so the saying goes. And the adage came true on Friday the 13th as it saw a couple of
movies opening and the release of a third one (
Lucky Kabootar) getting postponed due to technical reasons. However, none of the two movies has managed to make the cut at the
box office after Day 4.
Let’s begin with the most touted of the lot –
Jackpot. As the name suggests, the story is all about a
casino boat (in Goa) and crazy
con artists rushing to pinch the
jackpot money, interspersed with comedy one-liners, a good dose of skin show and an extremely predictable plot. Starring
Sunny Leone,
Sachiin Joshi and the veteran
Naseeruddin Shah (the Boss), the
comedy thriller has a total
BO collection of around Rs 6.4 crore till December 16, and the numbers do not augur well for
director Kaizad Gustad. It’s his fourth film, the earlier ones being
Bombay Boys,
Boom and
Bombil and Beatrice.
Critics, too, have flayed the flick unmercifully, mainly due to the absence of wit, thrill and suspense. Subhash K. Jha of SKJ
Bollywood News has given it no stars and says, “Jackpot is
noire film with twists in the tale.” Reagan Gavin Rasquinha of Times of India has given it 2 stars out of 5 while Shubhra Gupta of Indian Express has decided on a 1/2 star only. Avad M of Bollywood3 has rated the film 1.5/5 and stated that Naseeruddin Shah is the only saving grace of this movie as he is brilliant as the
notorious business man.
The music is praiseworthy, though, but the whole exercise puts a big question mark on the theme and the lead actors. Why do
Bollywood thrillers have to be inane, completely lacking that
fear factor which chills your bones without being explicit? As for Sunny, she has graduated fast from an
adult film actor to a
Bollywood heroine, but has a long way to go if she really wants to impress cine lovers.
Entrepreneur-turned-actor Sachiin has, however, a better exposure here. His earlier two outings –
Aazaan and
Mumbai Mirror – were big flops.
Aazaan, a 2011 action
spy flick starring Sachiin and South African
model Candice Boucher, had a
BO collection of Rs 4.2 crore, against a budget of Rs 37 crore.
Mumbai Mirror, a
crime thriller released in January this year, was again a disaster at the box office.
What the Fish in troubled waters We thought this one might have an interesting storyline evolving around
Dimple Kapadia. Ageing, divorced and suspicious,
Sudha Mishra (Dimple) is too much in love with her
goldfish and
money plant. And she turns out to be the grumpy old Delhi ‘mausi ji’ you meet almost every day. But when Sudha goes to visit her son for a month and her house is left in the care of her niece and her fiancé, they soon find others to do the chores and those others find some more people and the whole thing goes on…
All this is funny at first, as you may guess, but reeking of confusion and extremely haphazard at a later stage as more and more characters flit in and out of the house, all with some personal agendas. There’s no sparkling wit here or the softening grace of humour that makes classic comedy. So it’s no wonder that the BO numbers are really down – just Rs 2.9 crore after Day 4. This is the second flick by director
Gurmeet Singh after his debut film
Warning 3D, an underwater movie shot in
Fiji.
What The Fish has opened to some mixed reviews all over. Neha Gupta of Bollywood3 says that this is a novel concept and also lauds Dimple as absolutely brilliant. There are sight gags and a free-flowing style that leaves enough room for irreverent jokes. But the movie still lacks a strong binding thread and spirited performance that could have buoyed up this kind of disjointed comedy sequences. You fail to appreciate the many characters and the entire movie feels too episodic, instead of being a cohesive whole.
Image: Indiatimes.com
