Film: Krazzy 4

Director: Jaideep Sen

Release date: 11 April 2008 (UK)

Producers: Sunaina Roshan, Rakesh Roshan

The film stars Juhi Chawla, Arshad Warsi, Irrfan Khan, Rajpal Yadav, and Suresh Menon in lead roles, while Shah Rukh Khan and Hrithik Roshan appear in item numbers.

Review by Dr Usman Latif Khawaja

Krazzy 4 – SRK and the Rest

Could crazier have been better? Was the query I was left asking myself at the end of this comic caper, and the answer is – a plain yes.

If only the script and casting had been better, not that it is bad – as it easily eclipses the rest of the Bollywood brigade as a comic political satire and as a vainglorious love story – but the problem lies with the rather shoddy initial [premise] and the casting of Arshad Warsi as the lead, a man who is in a lunatic asylum for anger management. Well, I have never heard of such desperate measures for temper fits, and unfortunately, Mr Warsi neither has the presence of a leading man nor the talent to play this brilliant character.

The plot is narrative-driven and involves the encapsulated adventures of four runaways from an institution for the mentally ill in Mumbai, set around the eve celebrating India's 60 years of independence.

The story is given a twist as we encounter a gang of mafia mobsters who abduct the psychiatrist in charge of the four lunatics, brilliantly played by Juhi Chawla in a cameo, in a subplot to free a psychopathic criminal by blackmailing the doctor, who is an expert witness in this case, and can prove the bad guy innocent on grounds of insanity.

This is rather coy, but it is made interesting by the script, which gets into the perception of insanity by society and makes some brilliant remarks about our socio-political milieu, which works as comic satire and entertains simultaneously.

The four protagonists are well scripted. The best, easily, is the brilliant Rajpal Yadav. He was great in Chup Chup Ke, and here he ste...