The first thing you need to know about Go Goa Gone is that it rarely takes itself seriously and is not afraid to get downright silly. However, silly doesn’t always work. At least, it doesn’t work with everyone.
Directors Raj & DK, in their fourth outing after Flavors , 99 and Shor in the City , try to give a niche film mainstream dumbness... like spelling out what Zombies are and the basics of the genre, for the benefit of the mainstream audience and turning what begins like a stoner film into a moral science lesson about how drugs are bad for you, only to start tripping on the highly addictive “Babaji Ki Booti” moments later! Make up your mind, guys!
From successful and uncompromising middle of the road filmmaking, the directors this time try a crossover to the mainstream only to end up on the wall.
Neither here or there. It’s not art house. But it’s not entirely mainstream either. It’s not a satisfying zombie film (very little gore in an A rated film). It’s not a full on comedy either (as characters every now and then stop to review: So what do we know until now?)
However, if you are not looking for anything more than silly laughs, there is plenty to keep you hooked. The actors — Kunal Khemu, Vir Das, Anand Tiwari and Saif Ali Khan — are all terrific and make their lines work with their comic timing but then, the best lines are all in the trailer (Hindi dialogues by Sita Menon, Kunal Khemu and additional dialogues by Raja Sen).
Luckily for us, the filmmakers haven’t lost their touch of crafting feel good moments and the sum of the parts make up for the disappointing whole. Technically too, the film is top notch and you’re likely to be humming songs from the film for the next few days.
Censor demands have ensured that there is just too much of lecturing on the ill-effects of smoking, right from the start. But anyone who has seen Dude Where’s My Car or Harold and Kumar go to Whitecastle know that you can’t take those guys aside and give them a conscience at the end.
If you want to be irreverent, don’t even try to be politically correct.
If you want to hang out with the stoner dudes, don’t bring Mom. Unless she wants to roll.
Genre: ZomCom
Directors: Raj & DK
Cast: Kunal Khemu, Vir Das, Anand Tiwari, Puja Gupta, Saif Ali Khan
Storyline: Three friends, down on luck, head to a rave in Goa only to find zombies at the other end of it.
Bottomline: A harmless mindless mostly fun film that’s apologetic about its drug content
