Vicky Vidya Ka Woh Wala Video Movie Review: Rajkummar Rao, Triptii Dimri are unimpressive in this overlong, sloppy ride

A look at director Raaj Shaandilyaa’s filmography would reflect the ‘catchiness’ that is embedded in his tales. He made his directorial debut with Ayushmann Khurrana’s Dream Girl (2019), which told the story of a man who impersonates a woman, talking to horny clients at a shady call center. Raaj’s idea of a premise is sketchy and short-lived. He creates scenes majorly to make gags out of them without any sense of connection with the characters, who are mere agents of tickle. In 2023, he made a sequel, Dream Girl 2, which stretched the same idea to give more space to some more scenes which are dying to reach the punchline. At times, his films feel like a long joke that starts with an interesting setup but ultimately loses out on its own originality. His latest offering, the Rajkummar Rao and Triptii Dimri starrer, Vicky Vidya Ka Woh Wala Video is no different.

It begins with an awkwardly put together VFX infused scene of Vicky (Rajkummar) standing on the tracks in front of a running train. The brief prelude cuts before we get to see his fate. When we come back to it post-interval by traversing laboriously through the first half, its memory is lost on us. Do we really care what happens to Vicky? There is little to his character than the 90’s theme party style jacket, jeans and long hair. An extended opening sequence follows where he and Vidya (Triptii) trick their respective parents in order to get married to each other. All the major characters are introduced here as the plot picks up and the two go on a honeymoon to Goa. Vicky wants to record their first night and Vidya obliges after an initial discomfort. When they return back to Rishikesh, the CD of their recording goes missing during a house robbery. The rest of the film follows Vicky as he tries to get hold of the CD while battling multiple mishaps.

Directed by: Raaj Shaandilyaa

Starring: Rajkummar Rao, Triptii Dimri, Mallika Sherawat, Vijay Raaz, Archana Puran Singh, Mukesh Tiwari, Rakesh Bedi and Tiku Talsania

The plot is too thin to sustain a runtime of over 152 minutes. The film loses its track right through the opening 30 minutes when the jokes don’t land and the narrative beats don’t surprise much. It’s as if all the major plot points are already established in the trailer and there is hardly anything that you already don’t know. Even the inclusion of Vicky’s sister Chanda, played by Mallika Sherawat, and her developing affair with the frail police officer played by Vijay Raaz, is all noise and no play. There is an overdependence on creating humour just through some dated one-liners in the dialogue. All of it lacks the energy to really induce laughter or joy. The timing is off, the writing sketchy and the scenes lack a sense of continuity in them. All that remains is the sheer desperation to create gags. It leads to some downright crude instances when the house help, also named Chanda, takes the brunt of some classist and body-shaming jokes.

Raaj, who wrote for comedian Kapil Sharma and Krushna Abhishek for the TV show Comedy Circus, seems to not have grown much from his style of writing which is still filled with some superficial notions. The travel from TV to cinema is not exactly smooth. His screenplay has little character exploration and hence the staleness transfers even to the performances of the actors. Rajkummar seems to still embody his Vicky from the Stree franchise and all of his range subsumes into loud antics. While the Amar Kaushik directorial allowed the actor to bring out his vulnerabilities which in turn turned out to be funny, here much of it remains restricted to face-value. There is not much to do for Triptii too, who is able to portray just the emotions needed for the story and rarely does any of it stand out. Even Vijay Raaz, who otherwise has a unique screen presence, ends up falling flat. Archana Puran Singh is reduced to saying a few lines as the pan-chewing mother of Vidya. Mounting on such a strong cast, it is unbelievably shocking to witness the film derailing into elongated moments of dryness and boredom.

The plot really begins to get going in the middle of the second half when a random twist takes the film to a completely different direction to prepare for a tonally-inconsistent, emotionally charged finale. Everything is said and done. The ghost of a bride pops up and leaves without much explanation. Mimicry artists are pushed as characters playing Suniel Shetty. A kid with a lisp moves around in the background mispronouncing ‘S’ for ‘F’. A Hyderabadi thief brings up the peculiar dialect. Wait, was this really an episode of Comedy Circus then?