Review : Both the ‘Jodis’ of ‘Bunty Aur Babli 2’ entertain chasing each other!
It’s sequels era in Bollywood, these days. The success of yesteryears’ movies are being used to dish out a sequel. About 15 years ago #AbhishekBachchan and #RaniMukerji starrer #BuntyAurBabli was released and was hugely successful. The same film’s sequel is #BuntyAurBabli2 has addition of two new stars minus Abhishek Bachchan. In this movie #SaifAlikhan has replaced Jr Bachchan as Bunty and joins Rani’s Babli to offer different flavour to Bunty Aur Babli’s narrative. The film has updated version of Bunty and Babli as the new pair is highly educated and enter con business for social reasons. The writer director (Varun V Sharma) has tried to give reasoning for these new con-artists but it doesn’t come out convincingly. The corruption and failure of the society can not drive any one on ‘this’ road otherwise majority of the youngsters would be indulging in it. But the best part of ‘BaB2’ is that the earlier film’s characters are taken forwards unlike other films which only uses the ‘Title’ for encashing it’s popularity.
The films’ story revolves around new Bunty and Babli. Kunal Singh (Siddhant Chaturvedi) and Sonia Rawat (Sharvari Wagh) have passed out engineering and are jobless. They faithfully dabble in many ventures and are keen on 9 to 5 corporate job. But the state of affairs of the country and lack of opportunities lead them to try out a con-game. They are successful in their first con and like a bad habit and the smell easy money get them attracted to it even more. They use Bunty Aur Babli sigil as they are admirers of the original con-artists Bunty and Babli. Here original Bunty and Babli aka Rakesh and Vimmi Trivedi (Saif Ali Khan and Rani Mukerji), who are in their forties and leading a normal life by now, gets arrested thinking that they have reactivated their con-business. Actually both Babli and Bunty are furious too at the new Jodi for robbing their identity. The police chief Jatayu Singh (Pankaj Tripathi) forces them to help him find out new Bunty and Babli. And this takes audiences on a cat and mouse chase trip with intermittent doses of entertainment.
Actually in the last two decades a lot has changed, socially, technologically, politically and otherwise in our country. So the concept of the new BaB seems a bit outdated but it could have been showcased in an interesting manner by working on script. The screenplay seems to loose elasticity at times which hampers the connect with the audience.Still bringing two pairs of Bunty and Babli is gratifying though most of the times predictable. The scone half is pacy but the first half of the film needed a bit of scissoring. The production value of the film is very high and the visuals are appealing. The director shows signs of potential in a few scenes but much more was expected with the franchise like Bunty Aur Babli. Another disappointing factor is music. First BaB had splendid music and it’s title tune is used in this film too which if effective. None of the songs are worth remembering except the end-credit one, ‘Tattoo Waliye…’.
The films scores heavily in acting department. Saif Ali khan doesn’t disappoint as a new Bunty and his comic one liners are funny. Rani Mukerji has aced the middle aged Babli and the loud demeanour of Vimmi is perfectly portrayed. Siddhant Chaturvedi, after his MC Sher character in Gully Boy, has raised his game in this film and he dishes out a good and convincing performance. Sharvari is mesmerising in glamour portions and has shown her actings chops too in different garbs, disguises. She definitely has a good future in Bollywood as she has all the qualities a Bollywood heroine should possess.
All in all, both the ‘Jodis’ of ‘Bunty Aur Babli 2’ entertain chasing each other, having Jatayu Singh for a company.
Rating:- ***