Don wallah love

Once Upon A Time in Mumbai Dobaara

Starring:  Akshay Kumar, Imran Khan, Sonakshi Sinha

Rated: 5/10

Once upon a time in Mumbai, there used to be this inscrutable don who believed in doingmaar dhaad and keeping everything, including his emotions, under control.

But he came dobaara — and this time, he had the entire samunder ke baad ki Mumbai quite under his control. With no territorial wars to fight, no chhota bhais to be dealt with and no police running after him, he is virtually out of a job. So vela that he can now indulge in matters of the heart.

A don in love, is not worth even half in a fight, many would say. But scripting a donwallah love story here is Akshay Kumar and that’s what pretty much saves this rather slow and prolonged film by Millind Luthra. With no rumblings whatsoever in the underbelly, Akshay Kumar has spent time well to work on his don swagger and despite wearing oversized red shades, he sees enough oomph and innocence in an aspiring actress (all the way from the Kashmir Valley if you please) to declare that “pichhli wali ne niyat kharab ki thhi, yeh to Raavan se bhi Ram Ram bulwaygi”.

Sonakshi looks good despite her “intercourse” talk and acts well too, though Imran Khan is an oddity in the film despite being the other angle of the triangle. All the raised eyebrows, the youth and the taporidressing fails to lift him out of his own trap of ennui.

And as Mumbai was changing from “Kumkum to Kimi Katkar jaisi”, the film takes a leisurely stroll around Akshay’s love to obsession to possession journey which pretty much signifies dobaara.

The arresting part of the film, other than Akshay, is its dialogues. They are fully loaded boss and the writer Rajat, it seems, has grown up well since the original film which he wrote for too. He does well to make Akshay say things which enhance his over-the-top personality and, at times, when you are not laughing at them, you read some heavy ones in their folds. “Ma, behen ki gaali theek hai par tumne mujhe maara kaise” is one funny aside.

Aadmi to aurat ke hotey hain, mujhe to mard chahiye”. Hain? Come again please!

“Naam bata diya to pehchan bura maan jayegi”, says Akshay and the applause follows. The thing is, howsoever crazy the one-liners may be, he carries them off with explanation defying ferocity.

On the whole, the film, the second from Ekta’s Mumbai stable — and with sureshot a sequel in the pipeline — is languorous, long and only somewhat pulsating. The music is average and Akshay really has no competition here, not at all from Imran who was supposed to give him some fight somewhere. So would you want to go back to this bhai log ki Mumbaidobaara? Not really. Because the film finally boils down to living like one of its dialogues — pyaar naa, naukrani jaise ho gaya hai — aataa hai, bell bajata hai, kaam karta hai aur chala jaata hai....” Yes, Akshay you got it right!

Source: Sunday Pioneer, 18, August 2013