Housefull Review

Starring: Akshay Kumar, Deepika Padukone, Lara Dutta, Jiah Khan.
Direction: Sajid Khan
Music: Shankar Mahadevan, Ehsaan Noorani , Loy Mendonca
Production: Eros Entertainment
A biggie, which has done just about everything in the marketing front to make it the first choice in the theaters for any film lover this weekend. But was it worth it? The very first thought that comes to mind is the amount of money put in for the movie, or any other Akshay Kumar movie for that matter, in the past five-odd years. If you add 'Kambakth Ishq', 'Blue', 'CCTC' or so, you might end up with a figure which is not just mind numbing but as a good citizen you might also talk about money and/or resource wastage, forgetting the fact that as a good fan you have also seen all the previous movies in the first weekend. And all his movies never stopped outdoing the previous in the first weekend grosses but almost, most of the times, never see a profit. And 'Houseful' falls under the same cadre. A movie which will surely boast of an earth-shattering opening but can it sustain? Well let’s not predict the impossible and let’s get on to analyzing the obvious - 'Houseful' is below average.

Well, the movie is about a unlucky loser Aarush (Akshay Kumar) for whom nothing seems to go right. He hates his job, he loses his girl, and he goes to London to meet his childhood friend Bob (Ritesh), where some more misadventures follow only to get married to the wrong woman. But in the process, meets Miss. Right, Sandy (Deepika Padukone). Surprise! Sandy is the sister of Aarush's first girl friend Pooja (Malaika Arora) and also happens to be the sister of a strict secret agent Major Krishna Rao (Arjun Rampal). What happens next? If you have seen the Tamil hit, Kamal Hassan–Prabhu Deva starrer 'Kadhala Kadhala' and the Hollywood Blockbuster 'Meet the Parents' you wont have any problems answering that one, except for the utterly over-the-top and melodramatic Climax in the Buckingham Palace.

Houseful is a gag-fest, it doesn't rely on situational humor but more on physical and slapstick humor which might have few takers, but universal appeal is out of question. There are few really funny moments but we thought it was a two and half hours laugh-a-thon, right? Sajid Khan relies extremely on over-the-top physical humor but you need people who could carry that out to get the desired results, Ritesh was exceptional and carried out all the stupidity with extreme sincerity but the rest are a tad below mark, Boman Irani was good but somehow the movie would have got more elevation if the role was carried out by Paresh Rawal. Akshay Kumar was fine as usual but nothing spectacular to write about, Lara again overdoes her role but is still lovable, Deepika hams but looks gorgeous, Jiah Khan is wasted and she looks uninterested. It was good to see Randhir Kapoor after a long time and he does a good job. Arjun Rampal looks good and does a good job portraying the strict police officer. Chunky Pandey overacts as usual. Lilette Dubey is wasted but yet she does a brilliant job in the few scenes where she does make an appearance.

Technically, the movie was good, with the cinematography by Vikas Shivraman, being good but not great, though the much-talked about bikini's of the threesome was indeed taken brilliantly (for the front benchers and the people who are not ready to accept publicly their front bench mindset). Music was decent but we indeed expected greatness from Shankar-Ehsaan and Loy, so we are left a little disappointed. Editing by Rameshwar S Bhagat was fine though there were many continuation problems.

Overall, a movie which again had the potential but too much melodrama just spoils the soup. The second half does makes you sit up only to get dumped due to the utterly nonsensical climax.

Verdict: Error of comedy