Film: Bheja Fry

Director: Sagar Ballary

Producer: Handmade Films

Cast: Sarika, Vinay Pathak, Rajat Kapoor, Ranvir Shorey and Milind Soman

Rating: 3.5/5

Irritatingly entertaining! That’s what Bheja Fry is! What’s more, despite having actors like Sarika and Rajat Kapoor in this comedy of errors, it’s Vinay Pathak who has his cake and eats it too.

Ranjeet Thadani (Rajat Kapoor) is an arrogant music company owner and is married to a singer Sheetal (Sarika). Ranjeet along with his friends makes a hobby out of laughing at an idiot’s idiocracy. Every Friday night over dinner, he and his friends bring one idiot along with them and have a hearty laugh! That’s their idea of a stress buster.

Sheetal, on the other hand, is not too amused by her husband’s habit of poking fun at innocent people. Tired of his arrogance and bearing with it for two years, she decides to leave him and that too on a Friday night! So out goes Sheetal and in comes Bharat Bhushan (Vinay Pathak).

Ranjeet hurts his back on the same day but insists on going for the dinner since he had found his idiot in Bharat and there was no way he was going to miss the fun. Bharat is an officer with the Income Tax department and an aspiring singer.

Now this Bharat, he croons a Hindi song in every situation, which is PAINFUL to the ears. An idiot he might look, act and even be… but he’s not the one to leave anyone in the lurch. Ready to help on the press of a buzzer, the fun begins when Ranjeet and Bharat are stuck at home when another fall leaves Ranjeet in no condition to walk whatsoever, let alone go out for the planned dinner.

With his bad back, he ends up spending the evening with Bharat, who tries to help him get his wife back. What follows is nothing less than a laughathon with one calamity after another falling over the protagonists like a pack of cards. Pathak’s performance is brilliant and one which guarantees him a statute.

He delivers the role of Bharat Bhushan with such conviction and flamboyance that one forgets that he is only playing a character in a film. His facial expressions, portrayal of the character’s traits and nuances leave you rolling on the floor and begging for more. Hats off to debutant director Sagar Ballary for etching out Bharat’s character so well and to Pathak for playing it even better.

Ranvir Shorey steps into the role of Bharat’s friend and colleague Asif Merchant. Shorey has a small role but manages to leave an impact. It’s difficult to explain the permanent facial expression he wears in the movie and yet that’s what one remembers till the end. However, one pines for more of him considering the fact that he’s a great actor and would have set the screen on fire had he been given more screen space with Pathak.

Sarika too has a smallish role in the movie and passes as a wife who’s unhappy with her husband. However, the accident scene involving her was a little over-the-top considering that she was neither under the influence of alcohol nor was there anything in her path when she banged the car.

Milind Soman as Anant Ghosal is strictly okay. The characters played by Tom Alter (Doctor) and Harsh Chayya (Ranjeet’s friend) come and go and are not really worth a mention.

The dialogues are simple yet effective and manage to pack that extra punch and zing in the film. “Redial” and “It’s Ringing” is not something one’s going to forget for a long time! You just know it’s coming when Bharat picks up the phone to make a call!!!!!

Notably, both Pathak and Kapoor have been credited with improvisation in the dialogues of the movie.

A good comedy is hard to come by these days and this one is brilliant. Ballary can add the first feather in his cap for delivering a movie like Bheja Fry. The movie manages to show the importance of fools and idiots in our lives who unexpectedly can come to our rescue in dire situations – despite knowing the fact that they are being mocked at.

Lack of proper publicity may hamper the chances of the movie at the box office… nevertheless it’s not too late for the producers to pump in some kind of campaign activity so that the movie does not disappear from theatres like many other small budget movies. Word of mouth is surely going to help the film by leaps and bounds. It’s a good movie and one which deserves its space under the theatre roofs.

Watch this movie simply to laugh like you’ve never laughed before.