Bha Bha Ba Movie Review: Not enough method to this madness

Right from the announcement, Bha Bha Ba has been aggressively promoted with the tagline, 'No logic, only madness'. It is nothing but the equivalent of 'Keep your brain at home,’ an idiom filmmakers often use to suggest that viewers should turn off critical thinking and simply enjoy the experience. To its credit, Bha Bha Ba stays true to this tagline—absolutely no logic, but loads of madness. The question, however, is whether this madness is entertaining or merely hollow absurdity. The answer lies somewhere in between.

Director: Dhananjay Shankar

Cast: Dileep, Mohanlal, Vineeth Sreenivasan, Dhyan Sreenivasan, Baiju Santhosh

Rating: 2/5

Bha Bha Ba is a direct product of an increasing acceptance of 'fan-service cinema' today. Films like Petta, Good Bad Ugly, Jawan, and They Call Him OG have proven that when executed well, this genre can be a box-office juggernaut. This marks Malayalam cinema’s first full-fledged attempt at the form, ticking all the expected boxes: exaggerated star worship, meta humour, callbacks to iconic dialogues, pop-culture references, adrenaline-fuelled cameos, and celebratory slow-motion entrances. Predictably, as is the case with most such films, narrative depth is traded for euphoric moments, resulting in a slender storyline that somewhat serves the purpose.

Dileep is introduced as a "vattan," (a word the film uses with exhausting frequency) who kicks off the madness by kidnapping the Chief Minister in broad daylight. The CM's son (Vineeth Sreenivasan) heads the manhunt, a rather silly one where he conveniently waits for evidence to surface rather than actively pursuing leads. But who is this kidnapper? What are his intentions? What's his connection with the CM? It takes a while to get there, and the motivations aren't entirely new either. It’s evident that the makers aren’t particularly invested in these answers; the real focus is on assembling a tribute-heavy mashup.

However, the problem is, unlike Rajinikanth, SRK, or Ajith, Dileep doesn’t possess a vast catalogue of mass moments to mine endlessly. Although the makers milk the maximum out of Runway and CID Moosa, the nostalgia well soon runs dry, and that's when Mohanlal and Vijay step in. Clearly designed to tap into Vijay’s fan base, the film is peppered with references to his films, songs, dialogues, and mannerisms. In fact, Mohanlal plays a character named 'Ghilli' Balu and begins with the dialogue "Andha Area Indha Area..." You wonder if an actor of Mohanlal’s stature needs such padding, but the film commits fully to the bit.

The superstar is at his unhinged best, cracking self-referential jokes while unleashing all his iconic tricks, including the mundu swag and meesha piri. But with him playing such a cool character, who loves to show off his heroism and derives a high from it, the film should have gone beyond his trademark touches. Throughout this entire episode, Dileep takes a backseat, watching in awe of Mohanlal from the sidelines.

Dileep finally seems to have realised that his usual brand of humour has become stale and tries to redefine himself with Bha Bha Ba. His introductory scene cleverly subverts expectations when he stops short of slipping on a banana peel, breaks the fourth wall, and says, “Not anymore.” With a sinister grin, he stays true to the character, attempting to mine humour from eccentricity rather than slapstick. Dileep also keeps stressing that this is his 'true comeback'. With multiple iterations of this, it starts getting tiring after a point. Given the timing of the release, it's also hard to ignore repetitive dialogues about the police targeting him. It’s high time the actor stopped framing himself as a perennial victim on screen.

It’s also baffling how little space the film offers its female characters, especially considering it’s co-written by a woman. Save for Saranya Ponvannan, who badly deserved a better role, none of the women in the film register their presence. Perhaps the writers (Fahim Safar and Noorin Shereef) felt it was better to avoid tokenism altogether. Even otherwise, the script shows little interest in fleshing out meaty characters or strong emotional arcs. In its eagerness to break clichés, explicitly calling them out in dialogue, it ironically falls into familiar traps while constructing the protagonist’s backstory. With that, the film also tries to take itself a bit too seriously, contrary to the overall mood.

Debutant director Dhananjay Shankar, however, shows promise in staging large-scale action and mass sequences. The pre-interval stretch, in particular, stands out—a car chase that escalates into a full-blown confrontation between the police and the protagonist’s gang. The sequence is elevated by a couple of remixed retro songs and a terrific combination of hyper-stylistic camera movements and cuts. Although the climactic stretch also had a similar scope, the execution doesn't quite live up to it. The now-obligatory post-credit scene teasing a sequel is especially underwhelming, prompting the inevitable question: when will this franchise-baiting obsession end?

Bha Bha Ba doesn’t aspire to deliver groundbreaking storytelling or emotional depth. The objective is to go all out to amp up the craziness the stars generate among their hyperactive fandom, but even madness, to truly work, requires a little more method. And for Dileep, his true comeback will happen when he stops playing the victim and avoids whitewashing himself with every film.