Film review: Happy Bhag Jayegi’s flaws are frustrating

While Happy Bhag Jayegi is not bad, exactly, it still manages to frustrate with its many, many misses.

Diana Penty in Happy Bhaag Jayegi. Courtesy Eros International
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Happy Bhag Jayegi

Director: Mudassar Aziz

Starring: Abhay Deol, Diana Penty, Jimmy Sheirgill, Ali Afzal, Momal Sheikh

Two and half stars

One goes to the theatre with high expections for Happy Bhag Jayegi, after the trailer made you smile.

You are prepared for it to take a few liberties with logic – it is a Bollywood film after all. And in a world where movies such as the Housefull franchise – which are filled with crass, offensive jokes – are the biggest money-spinners in the genre, the bar for comedy is set pretty low.

Besides, how bad can an Abhay Deol movie be? While Happy Bhag Jayegi is not bad, exactly, it still manages to frustrate with its many, many misses.

Amritsar-borm Happy (Diana Penty) runs away from her wedding to local politician Bagga (Jimmy Sheirgill) to be with the love of her life, Guddu (Ali Fazal), but instead ends up at the Lahore home of Bilal Ahmed (Deol), a rising star of Pakistani politics. He plans to deport her, but she manages to run away from him, too. The rest of the film includes Ahmed’s efforts to reunite the two star-crossed lovers, Bagga’s attempts to separate them, a kidnapping, a jealous fiance and all the usual staples in a movie about a runaway bride, with plenty of forced attempts at humour.

The script by writer-director Mudassar Aziz seems to lose steam at the precise moment the story starts to get interesting. Bilal’s inability to stand up to his father, and his relationship with his fiance are promising sub-plots – but they are left hanging like loose threads.

Deol is stuck in a badly written role, while Penty was cast in one she is in no way suited for. She tries really hard to play the spunky, devil-may-care Punjabi girl, not unlike Kareena Kapoor's Geet in Jab We Met, but lacks both the screen presence and the acting chops to be convincing.

The film’s biggest winner is Jimmy Sheirgill, whose jilted-at-the-altar Bagga, elicits the only real, unreserved laughs. He steals every scene he’s in and saves the film from being a dull disaster.

artslife@thenational.ae