Genre: Romance
Director: Milap Milan Zaveri
Cast: Riteish Deshmukh, Jacqueline Fernandez, Vishal Malhotra, Ruslaan Mumtaz, Sonal Sehgal
Storyline: Boy meets alien girl. Boy loves alien girl. Boy gets alien girl
Bottomline: Supremely juvenile, extremely predictable and a cheesy romantic comedy with a totally unwarranted soppy climax
When you know it’s a film from the writer of Masti, Jhankaar Beats and Hey Baby, you know what to expect, don’t you?
Jaane Kahaan Se Aayi Hai has every bit of the writer’s stamp – wordplay as pun-ishment, cheap jokes, juvenile humour, male bonding, sexual innuendo and an unhealthy porn obsession that makes you wonder if Milap wrote this film way back when he was 17. But, at least, it earnestly captures the frustrations of the phase of life when girls just wanted to be “just friends”… except with the hottest guy around.
It’s these portions that give Jaane Kahaan Se Aayi Hai a promising start.
To get things started, Milap liberally borrows from Farah Khan’s cinema, not just in spirit and theme but also literally. He casts Farah as a director, recreates Om’s pining for the starlet in Om Shanti Om (cross that, it’s the star’s sister in this case) and lines up self-deprecatory star cameos that will make you smile. These are the most entertaining portions of the film which, otherwise, would have resembled Aladin with Riteish playing a Loser all over again, greatly in need of divine intervention/genie/girl from outer space to change his life.
Often reminding you of Shahid Kapoor’s debut film Ishq Vishq Pyaar Vyaar, (especially with Vishal Malhotra reprising his role as the hero’s sex-starved porn-addict best friend and Satish Shah as the salacious Dad yet again) Milap Milan Zaveri nurses greater ambitions of being the poor man’s Karan Johar (as Farah Khan reacts to the hero’s cheesy lines on love) and this is exactly what jars in an otherwise delightfully juvenile film.
Yet, the first half of the film is a breeze. The film coasts along with the easy-on-the-eye Jacqueline Fernandez playing the alien girl who falls into the boy’s arms at the lowest point in his life. Vishal Malhotra as Riteish’s best buddy Kaushal keeps the laughs coming with his obsession with pornstar Pink Pussycat and his attempts to make Tara (the alien girl) copy her moves.
Jacqueline is no doubt pretty, she does have an other-worldly ethereal smile, luscious long legs and a generous heart (Kaushal knows what I am talking about) to carry off this role and Riteish wears the lovelorn puppy-dog expression long enough to have you rooting for him. Together, the Riteish-Jacqueline-Vishal trio is dynamite as Milap’s writing sparkles with single-boy angst. “What’s a virgin,” asks alien girl. “Virgin is a very ill-fated human,” says the boy.
Where the film falters is towards the second half as Milap tries to get you all sentimental, stretching the climax portions to ridiculous levels with hardly any any real conflict to sustain the drama.
Barring the plot of boy falling for alien girl, there’s hardly anything even remotely original about this film. It plays out exactly as you predict it will, with nothing more than a few laughs and the crackling chemistry between the trio to keep it afloat.
Watch it only if you are 17 till you die. And if you remember what it was to be a single male who made girls’ heads turn… away.
MADRAS INK. 