Film: God Tussi Great Ho

Director: Rumi Jaffrey

Banner: Shabbo Arts

Producer: Afzal Khan

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Salman Khan, Manisha Koirala, Priyanka Chopra, Anupam Kher, Sohail Khan, Satish Kaushik, Dilip Tahil

Rating: 1.5/5

It’d be a shame to compare Rumi Jaffrey’s directorial debut God Tussi Great Ho with the original Tom Shadyac’s Bruce Almighty. Not because it doesn’t lift anything or isn’t as good but because God Tussi completely misses the point of Bruce Almighty. Neither does it take the argument of the original nor does it give meaning to anything of its own. Ultimately it turns out to be a farcical, didactic and shallow take on concepts as significant as God, belief, individual responsibility, the nature of human destiny and the role of human psyche.

God Tussi Great Ho is the story of AP-Arjun Prajapati (Salman Khan), a TV creative who can never get anything right. He is an underachiever at his job, he cannot propose to the girl he loves, Alia (Priyanka Chopra), he has a crabby father constantly complaining about his inefficiencies and a plain sister who cannot find suitors. Things cannot get worse when a competitor enters his life in the form of Rocky (Sohail Khan) threatening his precarious position at his job and his girl. Numerous jibes and screams at the unfairness of God later AP is summoned to God who gives him HIS powers for ten days to make him see the truths of the way the world is run.

Needless to say, AP runs into his share of victories and failures most of them personal forgetting to spread his powers to the real work that God gave him the powers for. Thus ensues the pre-climactic twist-in-the-tale imparting ‘great lessons’ to our hero that transform him from a loser to a winner.

For a money-spinning-good-for-a-few-laughs venture the movie owes no responsibilities to the greater questions it spawns. Fair enough. The writer-director completely forgets (or maybe he never knew it to begin with) that adding a touch of deeper questions, what is otherwise called ‘layers’ adds to the enjoyment of simple comedies much more than rolling around antics of aging heroes however big the names maybe. For this was a film that was not screwball, where the concept itself called for a slightly more mature perspective and an addition of a meaning in the whole proceedings. The ‘ekta’ message delivered in the end by God to the audience does not categorize it as meaningful.

The comedy, the lightness, and forced simplicity of the screenplay bring a marked superficiality to the film that provide no relief or laughs. Neither are the gags imaginative nor the chemistry between the players electric. The Khan Brothers rehash their Maine Pyaar Kyun Kiya jugalbandi to an insipid result while Priyanka Chopra is reduced to a doll without much to do. Her pairing with Salman Khan evokes no sentimentality or sympathy such is the lack of chemistry between them.

And the biggest disappointment of all is the Big B playing the Big G. Resplendent in all white, with the towering personality and the booming voice there couldn’t be a better choice than him to play God (Although Rishi Kapoor in Thoda Pyaar Thoda Magic was kind of cute but there is no comparison). Here was a gold mine that could have been cashed in to rivet audiences like never before. But all he gets is bland lines to deliver in altercations that make everyone look like fools; him, Salman Khan, and the audience.

The film spends a whale of a time trying to impress the viewer visually, what with God’s various CG-created kingdoms in flashy metallic colours interspersed with lavish sets for dance sequences that appear out of nowhere for nothing. But this exhibitionism comes to a naught when the film falls on its real floors and AP’s house, office and localities look like run down sets managed all by assistant art directors.

Salman Khan takes on the entire film on his muscled shoulders but does no justice to his character, plot or comic timing that he was once famous for. Jaded in looks, puffy under the eyes and a performance as unconvinced as it is unconvincing, Salman and the film seem to be selling something else altogether,. Jut what it is, is impossible to figure.

Despite the brand names it remains strictly avoidable. Since it is as brainless as they come with no laughs either, why waste the money?