Simplicity - a trait that seems to be missing from Hindi movies these days. What we have instead is a bucket full of tears, heavy melodrama, excessive violence, triangular love stories with unneccessary twists, the poor boy meets rich girl routine or insane and vulgar 'comedies' aimed at the masses. Hrishikesh Mukherjee the maker of several jubilee hits, notably 'Anand', 'Golmaal', 'Mili' and so forth brings a sweet n'classy comedy devoid of most of the ingredients above. It is a bit slow paced at times but simply hilarious - not in a slapstick, crazy kinda way but slightly subtle and subdued.
The story is very simple. Urmila (Juhi Chawla), returns home after her studies where her father (Amrish Puri) has arranged her marriage with his friend's son Chanakya (Sajid Khan). Only there's a slight problem. Urmila is in love with Shankar (Anil Kapoor) and convinces him to first win her father's heart rather than getting married without his consent. Rather reluctantly, Shankar aka Ramanuj arrives to the humble home as a paying guest to accomplish a rather futile task. He tries his level best to win over the stubborn father but keeps on foiling and messing up almost every chance he gets with the hard, retired ex-policeman. Meanwhile he successfully wins over his rather sweet wife with a few tears here n'there.
How, with the help of Urmi's mama, Chanakya and Urmila he wins over the tuff father's heart form the crux of the story.
Though nowhere in the league of his earlier hits, Hrishikesh Mukherjee churns out an entertaining and breezy film with loads of Indian values and morals attached. The editing is tight and none of the scenes seem loosley fitted in or out of place. The sets and screenplay are old fashioned but look real and match the context and mood of the film. Incidentally, the hero-heroine don't jet off to Switzerland to sing a song at every given opportunity - but rather the songs are shot in one place and make the film flow rather than disrupting it's continuity. Neither do Anil-Juhi change their outfit at every given opportunity - in fact they both wear the same outfits again and again to add more realism to the film. No designer Polo or Gap t-shirts thankfully...
The performances are all first grade. Anil Kapoor is brilliant as the bumbling Ramanuj, the crazy Shankar as well as the 'phoren' Margaret. His timing is perfect going to show how versatile he really is. Juhi Chawla looks gorgeus and oozes charm and freshness. She does well in the scenes she's given but does not have as much footage as Anil Kapoor and Amrish Puri. Talking of which, it is Amrish Puri who steals the show with his excellent Uptal Dutt type of performance. Sajid Khan makes a good debut but is not given much of a chance while Reema Lagoo and Anupam Kher are competent as the crazy mama and the loving mother respectively.
The cinematography and camerawork are good while Anand-Milind's music is quite good with numbers like 'Kya Rakhoon Tera Naam' and 'Dil Yeh Dil'. The pace of the movie is a tad slow at times though.
Like I said don't go in the cinema expecting 'Anand', 'Golmaal', 'Chupke Chupke' or something along those lines. But on it's own 'Jhooth Bole Kauwa Kaate' is a fun filled, pleasant movie with several side splitting scenes. Let's hope it does well, as it is a notch above the David Dhawan brand of comedy that has been prevalent at the box office of late.
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