BBUDDAH... IS A FUN SALUTE TO THE SUPERSTAR WE LOVE TO LOVE

AGELESS AMITABH

BBUDDAH... IS A FUN SALUTE TO THE SUPERSTAR WE LOVE TO LOVE

In the climax, Amitabh Bachchan, a killer on hire, turns the gun on his own gang of baddies, duping them into believing that it is the cops who are plucking them out one by one. He plants a bullet in the back of one, tosses a dynamite from one window to the adjacent one, fools a goon into handing him a loaded pistol only to have his brains blown out the next moment.... Off-screen, that is what Bachchan has been doing over the past few years. Duping the audience into believing that he has now moved into the bracket where he can only play the wronged father, the helpless husband or the doting grandfather. Every syllable that the superstar has been uttering — “at this age, I am lucky to get films” — is overturned by every scene and every moment in Bbuddah Hoga Terra Baap. From his entry shot where he blazes on to the screen leaning on the rails of an escalator, the lazy swagger unmissable, to the penultimate scene in which he swivels twice over and puts a bullet in the villain’s forehead using that famous left-handed shot, Bachchan seems to be on a Ginseng-overdrive, showing his middle finger to his younger co-stars. Bbuddah hoga terra baap? You bet. For, the Big B of Bollywood wouldn’t have it any other way. Felling his opponent with a single twitch of the finger, rocking a Harley Davidson or simply turning on the charm on a woman quarter his age, the 68-year-old is in fine form, having as much a blast on-screen as his audience — not all of them fanboys, mind you — does sitting in front of it. But call him an old man and he will go after you — either biting off your head or blowing it off depending on his mood, his indignation comically comparable to Obelix being called “fat”! Bbuddah… takes on from the larger-than-life south Indian school of cinema popularised by Ghajini, Wanted and Dabangg. The kind of films where script and screenplay, logic and characterisation hardly matter; what matters is one man. The plot is next to nothing, the characters are one too many and the screenplay disjointed, but you don’t really care as long as a 6’2” frame keeps your eyeballs engaged. Unpretentious and cool, Bachchan’s Viju is a one-man show. A Casanova one moment, an emotional husband the next. A trigger-happy gangster back from retirement in one scene, a man on a mission to cleanse the city the next. His wardrobe is as eclectic and colourful as his personality — floral shirts, bomber jackets, reflective glares and fluorescent scarves. Almost every scene that he is in is a medley of his greatest songs or scenes. He nudges aside a cop with the iconic Deewar line: “Hum jahaan khade hote hain, linewahaan se shuru hoti hai.” He shakes a leg to Go Meera go, which remixes every Bachchan hit you have grown up with — from Saara zamaana to Pag ghungroo, fromKhaike paan Banaraswala to Rang barse. The stylish flick of the revolver and the bending of the bullet is all Rajinikanth and in one scene, Bachchan does a Shah Rukh Khan with: “Kahaani mein kahaani ab bhi baaki hai mere dost!” And to think he says at one point in the film: “Yeh aajkal ke ladke mere gaano pe naachte hain, meri nakal utaarte hain!” The man — with Amol Rathod’s lens resting easily on every wrinkle and every muscle — clearly hasn’t had so much fun in a very long time. He is almost a superhero here, the kind that deserves a sequel. But with a better script. The dialogues are cocky, drawing on Bachchan’s ability to mouth even the most ridiculous lines effectively. “Maroonga toh goli se maroonga, BP ya sugar se nahin,” is a promo favourite. Our pick? When asked if he would prefer tea or coffee, Viju quips: “Chaicoffee ke saath soda achha nahin lagta.” With the Big B around, the others are reduced to cameos, but most manage to shine. Raveena Tandon as a vastly exaggerated groupie is fun, Sonu Sood as a tough cop is credible and Prakash Raj reprises his comic villain avatar from Wanted to bring on the guffaws. There are some poignant Baghban moments between AB and Hema Malini, especially the scene in which she walks away in a huff and then chooses to look back with the Naseeb title track playing in the background. Nostalgia never really goes out of fashion, does it? And neither does Bachchan, Amitabh Bachchan. Tu cheez badi hai mast mast to Sheher ki ladki,Yeh raat to Ore ore. Raveena Tandon has set the screen on fire in many a hit Bolly item number. The sizzle is back with Chandigarh di star (above) in BBuddah Hoga Terra Baap, a fun yet sexy number in which Raveena looks like a million bucks shaking her booty to the already-popular number sung by Sunidhi Chauhan. However, for those walking into a Bbuddah Hoga Terra Baap show this weekend hoping to catch the mast mast girl in Chandigarh di star, there is disappointment in store. The song doesn’t feature in the film! “Chandigarh di star was always meant to be a promo song. A lot of people have been tweeting and asking me why it isn’t there in the film, but the makers feel that it should only be a promo song,” Raveena told t2. The mother of two had a blast dancing to the song, which has lyrics like “Main Chandigarh di star/ munde slowin’ down the car/ sector 25 mein heel meri tutt gayi ni”. As Ravs put it: “I love music and dancing and these guys just rolled on the camera and let me party.”