Cast: Riteish Deshmukh, Pulkit Samrat, Chandan Roy Sanyal, Jacqueline Fernandez
Director: Karan Anshuman
Rating: * *
Karan Anshuman, the debutant director of this attempt at satirical farce was once a film critic. And it’s quite an irony that this film, written and directed by him, doesn’t speak in the same voice as his erstwhile criticisms.
‘Bangistan’ is kitschy mayhem cobbled together on a string and a prayer. The string represents the thin narrowly focused un-evolving storyline while the prayer is a metaphor for the theme of a world free of terrorism.
Nobly intended no doubt but the road to achieving that is treacherously strewn with land mines. Doesn’t seem like Karan Anshuman gave much thought to how he would get his two terror recruits from opposing religions, Hafeez Bin Ali(Riteish Deshmukh) , a disgruntled call centre employee and Pravin Chaturvedi(Pulkit Samrat) a wannabe actor who hopes his stint at the local RamLeela would garner him a bigger break, to a point where they would become friends and saviors of the world.
The story begins in Bangistan a fictitious country torn apart by religious strife between the two main warring religious communities. No prizes for guessing which. Both communities are geographically and ideologically at loggerheads , their spiritual leaders (Tom Alter and Shiv Subramaniam) have been trying to bridge the gap but rogue elements are out to further widen the distrust. And they choose the World Religion conference at Krakow, Poland to get across their point. Hafeez masquerades as a devout Hindu while Pravin tries hard to fake being a Muslim. They land up at the same boarding house and from thereon begins their attempts to customize their home made bomb jackets and eventually get it to the conference for some blasts.
The narrative could have been funny but the writing is such that while you admire the concept and the thought processes at work, you just don’t enjoy it’s translation on screen. The sitcom like structure, the toonish characterizations, the distinct lack of story-telling continuity, half-baked reasoning and abysmally low humor quotient puts paid to the entertainment. Those expecting to see much of Poland will also be disappointed because most of the shots in that country are taken either in-house or at the conference. Some fleeting images of the outdoors don’t make much impact either.
Karan Anshuman had impressed many with his critiquing skills but the same cannot be said about his directorial or scripting ones. The script gets decrepit in the middle section. And the climactic one delivered in sermonizing fashion just doesn’t cut any ice. The blundering terrorists angle was a great ploy but to have them intentionally turn in the slog overs, appeared too far-fetched. Also the subplot that involves a goat that Pravin is forced to adopt, doesn’t go anywhere near fruitful. Sequences that involve irreverent playful references to iconic ‘Citizen Kane’ and celebrated Wong Kar Wai don’t hit the sweet spot either. Riteish does a sincere turn, Pulkit is fluent and over-the-top in an entertaining way, Jacqueline has precious little to do, Shiv Subramaniam and Tom Alter stamp their importance in the scheme of things but it’s that chameleon like talent, Chandan Roy Sanyal, the everyman actor who actually comes good on entertainment! Despite his sketchy, all-too-brief, thankless role as a Bangladesh born Polish cab driver Tamim Hussain, he manages to assert his presence with skillfully accomplished élan. But I wouldn’t suggest you watch this movie even for that!
