Sajid Khan clearly doesn’t believe in logic which he accepts unabashedly. In “Humshakals”, he ups his game three-fold. But is it worth the wait? Is it close to other successful Sajid Khan films “Hey Baby”and “Housefull” series? Or is it a torture like “Himmatwala”? Read on to know.. Humshakals Review
Plot :
“Humshakals” is the story of the confusion and mayhem that takes place when three individuals have a lookalike of a lookalike, all with the same name.
In short, it’s the story of three individuals having triple roles. Confusing is it? Watch the movie to know the entire story..
An old billionaire is in coma, his only son Ashok (Saif Ali Khan) is a stand-up comedian . Ashok’s heinous uncle ‘KANS’ mama, read Kunwar Amar Nath Singh (Ram Kapoor), wants to usurp the entire property. He plots to send Ashok and his friend Kumar (Riteish Deshmukh) in a mental asylum.
In the asylum, we meet Ashok and Kumar’s lookalikes. Also present there is the uncle’s lookalike who is a dreaded criminal. And after few minutes, three more lookalikes appear on the screen. How and why? Don’t ask.
In between, we meet a sexy secretary, a pretty show anchor, a hot lady doctor, a mad mental asylum warden and a smuggler with two dwarfs as his bodyguards.
That’s it for the story? Well, yeah.. That’s all that I could find in the movie!
Performances :
The lead roles are played by Saif Ali Khan, Riteish Deshmukh and Ram Kapoor. All fo them are cast in triple roles ! (The makers probably knew that one of them wouldn’t suffice)
Saif Ali Khan plays the role of Ashok who is a stand-up comedian (a very bad one at that). He is sent to an asylum where he meets another Ashok (played by Saif again). To cut it all short, Saif disappoints with his weird antics and below par acting. His work has hit rock bottom and it would certainly take something like a ‘Langda Tyagi’ to bring him back.
Riteish Deshmukh plays Kumar who is Ashok’s best friend. He accompanies Ashok to the asylum and there begins his share of mimicry. He mimics the yesteryear actors perfectly and is a delight to watch. His other two looalikes (played by Riteish again) do not disappoint either. With such a narrow scope for performance, Riteish delivers a masterpiece!
Ram Kapoor plays his part as expected. He’s the next best actor in the movie (yeah, in a movie which doesn’t have anything in it to ‘perform’).
The women in the film – Bipasha, Tamanna and Esha have nothing to do. Needless to say, Bipasha made a smart move by not promoting this one.
Coming to Sajid Khan, the director of the film, well, one thing that I have understood from my past experience of Sajid Khan films is that you must not go for his movies looking out for a story or logic.
Idiocy is a gentle term for what is unleashed upon us.
Without a doubt, he disappoints(not that we expected much of him). Sajid Khan has yet again proved all that he knows about film making is – take a bunch of actors to London, try to spin an illogical story, push slapstick comedy several notches below by cracking jokes on disabled, homosexuals and foreigners and have a climax that will make you bang your head against the wall.
Nothing great on the camera work part or cinematography. It’s all too below-par!
The music of the film though deserves a special mention. That so because it spares us the horror of continuous mindless-ly stupid film in front of us. And there’s a Himesh song as well. Hmmm.. All you Himesss fans.. Roar!!
The film is a technical disaster!
Hawk-Eye Analysis :
You can call “Humshakals” a two-and-a-half hour showreel of plot-less, witless, joyless offensiveness.
There are some scenes in London and Mauritius, but the film is shot mostly within a ‘paagalkhana’.
Mostly the film is stuffed with Saif (at his worst) and Riteish (the only saving grace of this one) behaving weirdly,making faces, sticking their tongues out.
What is a surprise,of course, is Satish Shah as the Mental Asylum Warden who worships Gaddafi and Hitler. Aargh! His character has its moments but due to too much focus on the ‘triple role’ thing, he is side lined.
When you see Ram Kapoor use a Lollipop as a pacifier, you know the movie is heading nowehere. Where am I going with this, did you say? Relax, this is not a spoiler, it’s just a little detail in this jaw-droppingly, excruciatingly awful plot.
When the director is not taxing our brains with his story, he is taking pot-shots at his favourite targets. The seriously ill, the disabled, the mentally challenged, the gay people, the black people, the short people, are all on his radar.
Silliness can be great fun. Brainless doesn’t have to translate to brain-dead, when it is done with smarts. “Humshakals” has zero. Even in his really terrible moments, Sajid has managed to come up with one LOL moment. Or two. But here, there are none. Sigh!
Oh wait! There is one good joke in the movie. It’s when Sajid subjects the characters to watch his own version of “Himmatwala”. His victims go cross-eyed and shout ‘nahiiin’!
Otherwise, the movie is a pain.. in all the wrong places!
Lastly, if “Himmatwala” couldn’t break your limit of endurance, “Humshakals” definitely would.
Watch “Humshakals” only if you do not have a life and have lost all faith in humanity! Thank us for the warning later..
Final Verdict : 0.5/5
