For a film decidedly set against a confined backdrop, there is a lot going on in Ufff Ye Siyapaa. There is a contraband parcel, a marital couple having a tiff, a laundryman who sees more than he needs to, a wannabe cop who is too full of himself.  Ashok G’s comedy, starring Sohum Shah and Nushrratt Bharuccha, might be billed as a ‘dialogue less’ film, but is not necessarily quieter. It’s this overcompensatory love for chaos and broad humour is what does the film in — Ufff Ye Siyapaa is an admirable experiment that goes wrong nonetheless. 

Cast: Sohum Shah, Nushrratt Bharuccha, Nora Fatehi, Sharib Hashmi, Omkar Kapoor

Director: Ashok G

There is a clear farce-like energy to the film, both in content and execution. The unfortunate part is you are never sure how much of it is intentional. You want to give the film benefit of the doubt, especially for the visuals with sub-par VFX, but the lack of control gets to you. For most parts, Ufff Ye Siyapaa is excessive, loud and all over the place — except for one zany stretch. As Pushpa finds herself riled up over her daydreams about husband’s affair, it’s not just her life in chaos — everyone around her is suddenly losing it, including a mother figure who is suddenly chewing plastic. Rahman scores this brief montage with the necessary madness, and for about those two minutes, you understand what the director is going for. But slapstick and madcap doesn't suffice for a two hour long screenplay — both the maker and the audience learn this in excruciating ways.

The film particularly loses you during an elaborate stretch where Kesari (Sohum Shah) begins to spiral, imagining the various scenarios if the police finds out about the dead body in the house. By the time Kesari comes out of his spiral, you too have tuned out of the narrative. There is some intrigue about the events that unfold, especially around the interval mark, but the intrigue doesn’t lead to emotional investment in the characters or rooting for their survival. Our amusement remains distant and inconsistent.

Comparisons with Pushpaka Vimana would be unfair, although inevitable. And yet, as you watch the relentlessness unfold in Ufff Ye Siyapaa, you begin to ponder over the frantic pacing that comes at the cost of storytelling clarity, and wonder if this is what we have lost in last 40 years — an understanding and respect for poetry amidst the chaos. For a dialogue-less film, Ufff Ye Siyapaa absolutely refuses to respect the value of silence.  

The lines soon get blurry, and Ufff Ye Siyapaa begins to be quirky for the sake of it. Hasmukh’s colleague (Sadanand Patil), after a botched up session at the dentists’, continues his investigation with a dental plate in his mouth. Why? Because there are no rules in this narrative that believes in slapstick supremacy above anything else. Infact, Sohum Shah’s performance as Kesari — where he indulgently leans into bawdy physicality and goes overboard — is rather emblematic of the film’s intent and modus operandi. There is nothing wrong with having the ‘hot neighbour’ prototype, but there is something distasteful about the way Ashok G executes these scenes between Kesari and Kamini (Nora Fatehi). 

Among the lead cast, Nushrratt Bharuccha is the only one who brings genuine spunk and energy to the proceedings. She attunes herself easily to the farcical rhythms, and commits to the broad physical comedy. Dhanraj Koranani gets a few moments in the third act where he proves what can be achieved in this genre with a blend of skill and subtlety. 

This also has to be a rare occasion where AR Rahman is so burdened with the weight of capturing the essence of a story. Composing for a film that solely aims to run on its non-dialogue is a giant task, and Rahman gives it his everything — but it’s not enough. There are few moments where Rahman, and the writer-director, manage to tip into the whimsical nature of its concept, but these moments are few and far in between. 

In the climactic sequence, after a long-running cat-and-mouse chase between the many involved parties, a bag of money is flung open and we see countless currency notes flying all over the staircase. That strangely sums up the film too — unable to bear the pressure of its lofty ambitions and bottomless coterie of characters, Ufff Ye Siyapaa too ends up all over the place.