Movie Review: 'Chennai Express'

Rohit Shetty is back with his comic lens. This time around it is SRK’s turn to bring the joker cap on; he does and yes, he does justice too with his buffoonery to the level he best can. The movie starts with Rahul (SRK), a decent, middle-aged, single and craving-to-mingle Mumbaikar planning a trip to Goa when his destiny has already decided a bumpy South India trip for him. He brings Meena (Deepika) on board and then the movie along with the train gets hijacked by the outlaws of Chennai. It makes me feel sorry even to remember the scenes. Request you to see the trailer as it exactly tells you what the movie has to offer and if that is all to be offered then I leave it to your imagination what then over two hours are stuffed with.

Unlike her Cocktail character, Deepika is seen wrapped up throughout the movie, mainly in saris, and looks very elegant. She very successfully puts on a character of a confident, caring, religious, and freedom-loving Tamilian girl who struggles against her father’s wish to marry her off to a local, burly goon. But SRK is a hero who when spreads out his arms, charms girls and when swings his arms, whacks villains even though he is barely half the size of his mammoth opponents. Even a kindergartner of current generation will tell that SRK will be able to apply ‘Ek chutki sindoor’ (this time) and get hitched with the dimpled beauty.  It’s a poor and predictable story with trivial twists and no brain usage. In fact, you will add to the comedy if you dare to turn your brains on. As it is a Rohit Shetty work, there is no news that you will have cars flying, short non-vulgar comic lines, and scenes-capturing through top views. His attempt of infusing humour in communication through bollywood songs is well received. Moreover, Rohit seems to have done a good homework in livening up the rawness of the southern baddies. However, overdose of Tamil can really be off-putting for the outlanders. Couple of references of his past movies help SRK in adding to the fun he is supposed to deliver. Putting aside my personal liking for Deepika, the only pertinent adjective comes to my mind is ‘fantabulous’ for her performance. You will want to hear more bits of South-Indian Hindi from this charming chick. The movie scores well in the music department as almost all songs are hummable and form a grip with the moving story.

On the whole, it’s a good commercial attempt to capitalize on the festival and cash in on it. The movie mostly is a drag. I would solely blame the feeble script. You might feel sympathetic to SRK for going overboard in convincing that he can be funny. Deepika will manage to get you some smiles and the songs will give you some breaks from the nonsense you are trapped in. Don’t overestimate the power of the cast. Ready, Steady, Po far away from the theatres.