Consortium of corny punchlines

Film: Once Upon Ay Time In Mumbai Dobaara

Director: Milan Luthria

Shouldn't it have been Twice Upon A Time? Or a conventional Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai 2? Maybe a suffixed Returns or a completely different title altogether? But no, they decided to go with Once Upon Ay Time In Mumbai Dobaara (OUATIMD). And sadly, in this sequel to the film which was a decent re-creation of the 80s flamboyance, there are no talking points that go deeper than how the title should have been composed. In fact the entire film is as insignificant as the Y in the Ay and the A that was in the prequel's Mumbaai.

Overconfident from having sold the prequel, Luthria's film goes overboard with heavy-duty dialogues that swell up like helium balloons before bursting into nothingness. Every single line in the film, except perhaps the lyrics of the songs, is punctuated and exaggerated to sound deliberately ostentatious, which after a point makes you sick. The punches are only ironically amusing and it is hard not to judge the person sitting next to you, if he/she is genuinely falling for them.

Set roughly in the late 80s, the film picks nearly a decade after the climax of the previous film. Shoaib, played by Emraan Hashmi earlier, grows up and indigestibly turns into Akshay Kumar. And while the setting of a gangster thriller idly loiters around; OUATIMD plays itself out like a ridiculously childish, set-piece love triangle.

After Lootera, the sudden rise in expectations from Sonakshi have led to further disappointment as her character Jasmine sees her regress into the submissive, powerless role where she is at the mercy of two powerful men. One of those men, Shoaib, played by Akshay, is the villain, while Imran's Aslam is the archetypal hero.

Akshay Kumar simply recites punchlines throughout the film, with a cigarette, that has no regard for continuity, constantly lit between his fingers. Lacking the powerful aura of Ajay Devgn's Sultan Mirza and the charisma of Emraan's Shoaib, his black shades and well-kept hair hardly create a persona. While the first film gave us the memorable “Duaa mein yaad rakhna” by Sultan Mirza, Akshay's Shoaib throws one too many dialogues for us to remember any of them. And Imran Khan disappoints once again (or dobaara, if you may), with his contemporary body language and South Bombay accent. Maybe he never received the text that said the movie was set in the 80s.

Overall, OUATIMD is a null and void movie which serves no purpose other than killing time inside an air-conditioned dark-room. However, it will make truck loads of money and set precedents for more dobaaras of the same category.

At 160 minutes, the film is a fitting punishment to give to someone who has just lost a bet. With repetitive sentiments and caricatured leads, the film is a long test of endurance for anyone with a good taste in cinema. Beyond redemption, it wouldn't matter what the critics say. To put it in Shoaib's words, (read in Akshay's husky voice) -- “Agar aisi film ko rating diya, toh number bura maan jayenge.”

Rating: 1 out of 5 

Published in DNA (Pune) on August 17, 2013