Banner: Base Industries Group Producer: Firoz Nadiadwala Director: Neeraj Vohra Story/Screenplay/Dialogues: Neeraj Vohra Cinematography: Velraj Music: Himesh Reshamiya Action: Abbas Ali Moghul
Cast: Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty, Paresh Rawal, Bipasha Basu, Rimmi Sen, Johnny Lever, Manoj Joshi, Rajpal Yadav, Sharat Saxena, Suresh Menon, Dinesh Hingoo, Javed Khan, Tiku Talsania, Millind Gunaji, Ravi Kissen, Razzak Khan, Viju Khote, Sunil Pal, Neeraj Vohra with Diya Mirza in a Sizzling Appearance and Nana Patekar as the narrator.
Genre: Comedy Released: June 9th 2006 Status: H I T!
Ever since the day a sequel to Priyadarshans sleeper hit HERA PHERI was announced with Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty and Paresh Rawal returning as the three principal characters Raju, Shyam and Baburao Apte and lavish producer Firoz Nadiadwala (HERA PHERI, AWAARA PAAGAL DEEWANA, DEEWANE HUYE PAAGAL) backing the project the movie has been highly anticipated. Does the movie live up to expectations? How does it rank next to the first part? The answer to that is a big fat NO-the movie is a disappointment as far as expectations go! Heck PHIR HERA PHERI is an average film at best saved by some spirited performances from Akshay Kumar and Paresh Rawal.
The first HERA PHERI ended with the trio receiving a large some of money from Devi Prasad (Khulbhushan Kharbandha). The second part takes off directly where the first one finished.
The wealthy trio now live in a luxury bungalow and have a good lifestyle though they are still fighting and arguing as much as ever. Raju comes across a opportunity with a chit-fund company and the gorgeous saleswomen(Bipasha Basu) convinces him he can double his money within 2 weeks but in order for that to happen he needs 1 crore to invest. He manages to convince Shyam and Baburao to give him 10 lakhs each but that still leaves him 70 lakhs short. He runs into a street-wise thug (Rajpal Yadav) who too wants in on the scheme and contributes 20 lakhs. In order to get the remainder 50 lakhs Raju sells the bungalow to a Parsi (Dinesh Hingoo) without telling Shyam and Baburao.
Three weeks later Raju finds out that the entire chit-fund company was a huge SCAM and the trio lose all their money.
Back on the streets and now living in a chawl a new scheme is devised to get more money….a scheme with a lot of HERA and PHERI..PHIR SE!
In theory this sounded like the apt sequel and the perfect continuation for a story..The trio losing their money and are plunged into another adventure for the Indian dream however it’s the story/screenplay of the movie that is a huge letdown.
Writer Neeraj Vohra starts out the movie EXTREMELY well establishing where the trio is at in their life right up to the point where they get duped. From there on when they start running into various gangsters and landing themselves into deeper and deeper trouble the movie starts to lose momentum and the jokes start running out fast. In terms of a screenplay the movie recycles many gags from the first but with less impact this time round. The sequence of events that follow infact tend to get rather annoying/confusing in the second half of the movie. An effort to link this movie to the first part(by having Bipashas little sister kidnapped by Kabeeras brother played by Razzak Khan) seems forced and rather unnecessary.
As a director Neeraj Vohra makes a better movie than his first film KHILADI 420. However given the first one was a near classic, Neeraj Vohras direction is NOWHERE near in the same class or league as Priyadarshan. Priyadarshan is the “guru” and Vohra is nothing more than the “chela” who tries to imitate Priyans style but sadly doesn’t success overall.
There are scenes he handles extremely well specially the ones which have the trio in them-but a lot of that comes from the natural chemistry that Paresh, Akshay, Suniel share with each other rather than the work of a sound director. It’s the second half where the movie really starts to falter and fall down further and further as Neeraj goes overboard in introducing more and more comic characters none of which really evoke laughter. Infact apart from Akshay, Paresh and Suniel the only other actor that evokes some kind of laughter is Rajpal Yadav who too is a regular on the scene. The climax of the movie is a direct rip-off from Priyadarshan films like HUNGAMA, HULCHUL, MAAL A MAAL WEEKLY etc however it lacks the control and finesse of a gifted director. Despite al the mayhem in the climax of Priyan films..despite all the actors letting themselves completely loose and chasing after one thing(be it a person, a ring..) one can tell the director is in control. Here in the circus themed climax the actors go loose and the climax just starts to get sillier and sillier even resorting to the worst of 70’s humour with people ripping each others shirts off.
Neeraj Vohras forte has always been his dialogues imo. Witty and downright hilarious and PHIR HERA PHERI is no different in that regards. The dialogues uttered by the trio are just FANTASTIC and evoke laughter from start to finish. Infact I would go as far as to say apart from the performances-the mainstay of the movie is the dialogues by Vohra..a job well done!
In terms of performances the movie is a mixed bag…
Akshay Kumar is SUPERB as ever in a role that comes to him naturally. No doubt Akshays comic timing is splendid and the actor excels at these kinds of roles and here in PHIR HERA PHERI he makes his role look easy. From his tongue-in-cheek one liners to his facial expressions to his body language he plays the street smart Raju to perfection. There is criticism that Akshay is starting to play too many comic roles with the same affect but I haven’t yet got bored of him playing comic roles. Like Ajay Devgan and his “serious, silent, brooding” persona which I haven’t got bored of yet…Akshay too manages to throw a different dimension into his comic performances each time!
Suniel Shetty is quiet good in his part but there’s no doubt that he is a second fiddle to Akshay and Paresh. Priyadarshan always had faith in Suniels comic abilities and both Akshay/Suniel had equal footage in the original. Here Suniel is regulated to a backseat and though he is there throughout the movie and does make his presence felt it is obvious that the focus is clearly more on Akshay and Paresh. In saying what made the movie so famous that its not a franchise is because it’s a TRIO and Suniel Shetty is very much part of the trio.
Paresh Rawal OWNS this movie from the first scene to the very last. The actor reprises Babu Rao Apte again and plays the character to utmost PERFECTION and evokes laughter like no other. He is the mainstay of the movie and each and every scene he is in…each and every dialogue he utters..heck the man just has to BE ON SCREEN and he is funny. Rawal is a genius and Babu Rao Apte is a perfect testament to that. Once again Paresh Rawal walks away with the thunder in one of the funniest performances I have seen lately.
At this stage I would again like to re-iterate that it’s the chemistry between these three actors that makes the movie work here. The three together are pure DYNAMITE!
The supporting cast in the movie are below expectations.
Rimmi Sen once again does her 2-bit role (she is a lucky mascot to the Akshay, Paresh, Suniel jodi) and plays her limited part well enough. She looks beautiful as always but one wishes she had slightly more meatier footage.
Bipasha Basu too has extremely little footage in a poorly etched role however she too looks GORGEOUS(though nothing like she did in OMKARA..she was PURE SEX in that movie!)
The movie has a range of supporting/character actors none of whom really leave a mark.
Rajpal Yadav is efficient as ever in the scenes that he has however one does feel he could’ve been utilised better.
Johnny Lever after some funny performances lately in films like DEEWANE HUYE PAAGAL and 36, CHINATOWN is disappointing here. Manoj Joshi, Sharat Saxena, Ravi Kissen, Suresh Menon, Millind Gunaji, Dinesh Hingoo, Razzak Khan are all below expectations here-the problem being that there are just too many characters to focus on unlike HERA PHERI which just had a few key supporting actors who were properly developed. Watch out for Neeraj Vohra in the climax as the clown.
Diya Mirza sizzle in her item number at the start while Nana Patekars voiceover is perfect to set the mood of the movie.
Technically the movie is OK. Velraj’s cinematography is good-but one feels that this is not as crisp as the original. Abbas Ali Moghuls action/stunts too are functional.
Musically Himesh Reshammiyas delivers some entertaining tunes here as always but why have the songs been cut? The song MUJHE YAAD SATAYE TERI doesn’t play in full and cuts out abruptly before the song even finishes? Also AE MERI ZORAJABEEN only appears in the ending credits which act as a disappointment. The title track is well picturised on the trio.
All up where does that leave PHIR HERA PHERI? Well though the movie doesn’t live up to expectations the franchise itself definitely has potential. The characters of Baburao, Raju and Shyam and HILARIOUS and the amount of mischief they can get up to leaves a lot of possibilities and room for ideas but the need of the hour is a much tighter screenplay, a decent story, some new gags as well as more concentration/effort made on the supporting actors though I don’t think Firoz is too worried about that 40+ crores later as he is already on his way to making the third HERA PHERI?
Overall Rating= 7.0/10.0
A.Shah
Final Rating: * * * ½
