Jhootha Kahin Ka movie review: This Rishi Kapoor vehicle is only fooling itself

This film opens with a 'thank you' note to the Mauritian government. It’s a giveaway, really. Over the last twenty years or so, the scenic island-state off the east coast of Africa, known for its lucrative tax rebates, has hosted countless Hindi films, mostly dumb erotica. As though to distinguish Jhootha Kahin Ka from the clutter, director Smeep Kang sets it far from the beaches and dockyards. It’s a comedy, and it plays out on the most unremarkable residential street imaginable. In this sense, the film does right by the Indian tourist, who loves travelling to faraway lands only to stay put indoors.

Cast: Rishi Kapoor, Jimmy Sheirgill

Director: Smeep Kang

Varun (Omkar Kapoor) marries an Indian-origin Mauritian girl. He fibs about being orphaned and moves in with his in-laws.  Back in Punjab, Varun’s father Yograj (Rishi Kapoor) is a retired police officer. With his farmlands splitting up, Yograj decides to shift to Mauritius as well, bringing along a bloodsucking saala (Rajesh Sharma, endlessly funny as an outraged crank).

In a parallel track, Karan (Sunny Singh) is Varun’s best friend. He has a brother, Tommy (Jimmy Sheirgill), a convict awaiting parole. Tommy is touchy about his name, which is understandable, and does not want Karan to marry beneath his stature (this is debatable). The two narratives converge and collide, stopping at nothing to batter our brains with confusion and hi-jinks.

Rishi Kapoor looks like the Air India mascot without the giant headgear. The veteran actor shows great comic strength, grinding forth on dull gags with a rustic conviction. He is paired opposite Lillete Dubey, and in the scene where he announces himself on her front porch, Bachna Ae Haseeno plays in the background. Manoj Joshi excels as a suspicious neighbour bound to a wheelchair; the actor’s greatest strength remains his voice, injecting sharp Gujarati paranoia in the simplest of lines.

Jimmy Sheirgill’s Bihari jailbird disappoints. The actor doesn’t have as much fun as he does in Family Of Thakurganj, the other Hindi release this week. Sunny is a notch better performer than Omkar, and easily upstages his co-star in most scenes. Nimisha Mehta plays the female lead, a French instructor (in a scarring aside, she reveals to her students the French for pineapple: ‘ananas’).

Comedies like Jhootha Ka Nahin are horror in today’s age. Their ‘error’ isn’t derived from characters double-dealing each other, but in filmmakers thinking they can double-deal the audience. The resolute daftness of their screenplays is only broken by the Punjabi music videos that pop up from time to time. It’s particularly distressing — yet revealing — when Sunny Leone in a mermaid suit is all that keeps a film from drowning