Life Mein Kabhie Kabhiee Movie Review: Make it Never Ever!

In Life Main Kabhie Kabhie, Vikram Bhatt seems to start on a fairly decent premise. An interesting concept, the pursuit of happiness. But the director ends up making quite a mess of it. Of course, he is ably supported in this endeavour by his script & dialogue writer and the delightful cast of non-actors. Full credit to them as well.

But first things first. The story of the film revolves around a period of five years in the life of five friends. Their goal is Happiness. So our five friends --- Manish (Aftab Shivdasani), Rajeev (Dino Morea), Jai (Sameer Dattani), Monica (Nauheed Cyrusi) and Ishita (Anjori Alagh), get drunk one night and lay a wager on who among them would be the happiest at the end of five years. Aftab's character is the one which will decide the winner at the end of the period. All five have their own ideas on what will make them happy in life. While for Rajeev it is success, for Monica it is fame, power for Jai and money for Ishita.

So far so good. But then begins this clich?-ridden journey of these characters as they begin their pursuit of happiness. So quite naturally, Rajeev, a businessman resorts to all kinds of underhand, shady deals to reach the top. And quite naturally, since ambition is never a positive quality, at least not in Hindi films, he ends up crashing big time till rescued by his saintly elder brother, played to boring perfection by Mohnish Behl. (Hasn't he done millions of such roles already?)

The pursuit of power is inevitably linked with politics and so Jai starts out as a humble worker of a political outfit. He manoeuvres his way to the top with a series of audacious plans, some blackmail and murder. But soon finds himself on the psychiatrist's couch. Actually make it the psychiatrist's arms.

Money leads the third character Ishita into the arms of millionaire playboy Raj Zutshi. As for fame, the good Monica enters the tinsel world

with faithful boyfriend in tow and ends up in bed with her leading man (Rajat Bedi). Yawnn!

All their worlds come crashing down as they realise that they are not happy. None the sooner for us. Except for good old Aftab & Koel Purie. The good, simple souls, who triumph at the end, with an ordinary life well lived.

So there. Vikram Bhatt has made a movie with a moral: Beware of ambitions. Shakespeare wrote a play too about it. But hence lies the difference. It is probably asking for too much to expect a sensible exposition on the theme. The film plays out like a moral parable for children and has absolutely nothing to offer to an adult audience. Bhatt sticks to stereotypes, be it his characters or the situations they find themselves in. There is no attempt to inject anything relevant to our contemporary lives. It's just an attempt to glorify the banal. Wonder if that's what he was thinking of while making the film?

The storytelling may be flawed. But the first half of the film still plays out at decent pace as the characters set out on their journey. It is in the second half that the film begins to fall apart with the director unable to rise above clich?s. The second half even begins to look tacky. The characters remain flat. There is no attempt to flesh them out. Of course, the bunch of non-actors are of no help either.

Sameer Dattani is at his wooden best. He tries hard to look the part of the angry angst-ridden young man but ends up looking more wooden, if that's possible. Anjori Alagh and Nauheed Cyrusi follow his cue faithfully. Ditto for Dino. The saving grace, if any, is the Aftab-Koel Purie track which has its delightfully mad moments. In fact, even Raj Zutshi as the decadent playboy millionaire is a treat to watch. Wonder what Anuuj Saawhney (he plays the long-suffering boyfriend to Nauheed), is doing in a minuscule role like this?

The music by Lalit Pandit, part of the former Jatin-Lalit jodi, is highly forgettable. There is nothing to recommend there. So there is really no reason why one would want to watch this film. Maybe, as a lesson in how wrong you can get with a decent concept.!

The film, which is being touted as a film for and about youthful dreams and aspirations, has nothing youthful about it, except for some of it cast. The treatment remains age-old. Rest assured, there is nothing new there. Leaves you feeling weary.

Oh, and by the way, no prizes for guessing who won the wager in the film!