At a time when buffoonery moonlights as humour, director Pawan Bawa’s Jassi Weds Jassi throws forward a giggly googlie which might not be a chuckle fest (when was the last time you saw a really funny Hindi film?) but it feasts on an abundance of moments when you will smile (maybe not laugh out aloud) a while.
The script, a chaos of comicality caused by a cornucopia of characters named ‘Jassi’, takes us back to the 1990s when cassettes, landline phones and love letters ruled mankind. The mobile had not yet taken over lives (more on that later) and everyone had more fun in life in spite of no dating apps and reels.
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This world comes alive in spurts in Bawa and Akshara Sanwal’s writing. The screenplay sometimes sparkles with mischievous characters up to pranks which seem silly in hindsight. But at least people back then had an appetite for fun.
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There is Jaspreet (Jassi) played by Harsh Vardhan Singh Deo who phone-pranks a saree seller Saigal (Ranvir Shorey, priceless in his cluelessness) pretending to be a woman in search of some fun.
Shorey’s clothes and body language change according to the demands of the voice on the phone. His ingenuous wife Pinky (the inexcusably underrated Grusha Kapoor) can feel her husband’s dormant hormones awakening. Kapoor is a hoot as the suspicious wife, a character that would have acquired a smudge of poignancy if played by Divya Dutta.
Besides Shorey and Grusha Kapoor, it is the ever-dependable Manu Rishi Chadha who buffers the show with his performance as the cop with a soft spot for his friend’s daughter. This is dangerous territory (all right, taboo, if you ‘incest’). Manu manages to eliminate the sleaze from the situation.
The same goes for the film which never tumbles from the titter terrain into the zone of cheesiness. Carpeted with quirky (but never creepy) characters, Jassi Weds Jassi loses control in pursuit of a sufficiently manic climax.
The Curse Of The Second Half doesn’t entirely kill the amusement that wafts across this breezy burlesque on mores and mindsets at a time when Kumar Sanu ruled the airwaves. Characters like Jaspreet, Jasmeet (Rehmat Rattan), Balbir (Amit Vikram Pandey), Bittu (Syed Junaid Ali) and Jaswinder (Sikandar Kher) remind us of a time when life was so much easier for those who wanted to be loved. At least, they stood a chance.
It all ends with a cellphone appearing on screen, reminding us that the days of innocent fun had ended. Back to the grind.
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