Language: Hindi
Genre: Comedy/Socio-political Satire
Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Ravi Baswani, Bhakti Barve, Satish Shah, Om Puri, Pankaj Kapoor. Satish Kaushik, Neena Gupta, Deepak Qazir, Rajesh Puri as Kamdar, Vidhu Vinod Chopra
Director: Kundan Shah
Reasons to Watch: The very best of Hindi cinema, a dark laugh riot and the very best of offbeat Hindi cinestars
Reasons not to: You don’t know hindi..!(Simple, Get subtitles..!)
Storyline: Professional photographers Sudhir Mishra (Ravi Baswani) and Vinod Chopra (Naseeruddin Shah) open a studio in Mumbai and hope to hit it big despite a shoddy start. As their first real assignment they begin to work for “Khabardar” magazine, the editor of which, Shobha Sen, (Bhakti Bharve)’instigates’ them to probe the lives of the rich and scandalous. While investigating a case involving two builders Tarneja (Pankaj Kapur) and Ahuja (Om Puri), and their alliance with Municipal Commissioner D’Mello (Satish Shah), they come across corruption and treachery, and by chance become witnesses to a murder. What follows is complete pandemonium with these two trying to bring the culprits to justice and an end to corruption.
Climax Handling: The climax of the movie is the best comic sequence ever written in Indian cinema so much so that it inspired the end of a Hollywood movie five years later.
Points: This movie is all about dark, satirical humour while touching the deepest and darkest corners of the socio-political scene of India during that time. Most of the movie’s cast are NSD and FTII graduates and gold-medallists, who went on to become famous actors and directors of national, international fame and also of the small screen. A must watch.
Overall Rating: 9/10
Comment: Roll on the floor and laugh your ass off..! The second half will kill you with its humour…!
