This may sound too preposterous but throughout Jhootha Kahin Ka, I was thinking of Hrishikesh Mukherjee. A bunch of his gentle and genteel comedies — Chupke Chupke, Golmaal, Jhooth Bole Kauwa Kaate — have sprung from mistaken identities and harmless lies. Smeep Kang also tries to build his film on a similar web of falsehoods and adds elements of the Luv Ranjan brand of romcoms, told from the point of view of callow young men. But, beyond a few inspired moments towards the end, the film refuses to fly.
Varun (Omkar Kapoor) can’t get along with his farmer dad Yograj (Rishi Kapoor) in Punjab and goes back to Mauritius in search of a job. Soon we find him lying his way through to get married to Riya (Nimisha Mehta). One lie leads to another and it’s no holds barred when his father decides to come calling.
- Director: Smeep Kang
- Starring: Rishi Kapoor, Jimmy Sheirgill, Rajesh Sharma, Manoj Joshi, Sunny Singh, Omkar Kapoor, Lillete Dubey, Nimisha Mehta, Pujita Ponnad
- Storyline: Varun (Omkar Kapoor) can’t get along with his farmer dad Yograj (Rishi Kapoor) in Punjab and goes back to Mauritius in search of a job. Soon we find him lying his way through to get married to Riya (Nimisha Mehta). One lie leads to another and it’s no holds barred when his father decides to come calling
- Runtime: 136.35 minutes
Mukherjee’s humour emerged organically from the kooky situations his characters would get caught in, and he had an intrinsically dignified way of juggling with even the risque elements. But Kang can’t stop the humour turning loud and crass with double entendre slipping in, specially when it comes to women. It’s not just the sexist jokes, here the women are rendered deliberately vapid and inconsequential, unlike Mukherjee’s sparkling ladies.
The single biggest problem, however, is that the young cast is colourless to the core, unable to leave an impression. Their only strength, so to speak, that keeps getting projected on the big screen, is jiving with a group of dancers in the background on the beach. But even that is utterly forgettable.
It’s the older actors who manage to somehow hold the show together: Rishi Kapoor and Rajesh Sharma with their brothers-in-law banter, Rakesh Bedi in a small but effective turn and the reliable Jimmy Sheirgill. As a sharp-shooter called Tommy he is the butt of some infantile man-dog jokes that only he could have pulled off with his deadpan comic timing.
