Dear makers of Welcome Back,
A very fine day to you, sirs! This is my first open letter to anyone, so if you find my language coarse anywhere, please forgive me. I happened to watch Welcome Back today, and I need to vent my pent-up frustrations. But before I give you the reason why, let me give you an idea what I thought of your film…
What’s it about:
We are first re-introduced to Uday (Nana Patekar) and Majnu (Anil Kapoor) those loveable goons from the last film. Following the events of the last film, they have reformed and doing all white business. And they are craving for a wife as well! So far…so good….But picture to abhi baaki hai, and you sirs have to justify the existence of the sequel. So you bring a stepsister for Uday out of nowhere, using a flimsy and convenient plot-device of a tharki father (Nana Patekar again, insulting all South Indians and Shetty’s in a single scene!). That stepsister is Ranjana (Shruti Haasan, whose acting makes us wish Katrina Kaif should have got her National award for Welcome). Now she needs a hero and Paresh Rawal had agreed to give you dates out of his busy Lok Sabha schedule for some unknown reason. So you bring his Ghungroo character back and give him a stepson in Ajju (John Abraham), a dreaded goon in Mumbai, whose intro is in a bawdy item song and whose sidekicks openly leer at girls. Yup, you want us to accept him as a hero. We go along with the flow and do so. Now you make the dons’ sister fall in love with this Hulk in one of the most cringe-worthy scenes and later, song of the year. When her brothers realise that even Ajju was into bone-breaking business, they get angry and opposes the match, leading the hero to hitting their goons and challenging them openly. As our heads are still reeling by what’s going on with the plot, you sirs thought this madness is not enough and you bring in a blind don (Naseeruddin Shah, gulp!) and his charsi son (Shiney Ahuja, double gulp!). And since you thought Uday and Majnu prancing around in their ’50s is funny, you put in another subplot of a conniving mother (Dimple Kapadia, added to the cast when they couldn’t get hold of her son-in-law!) and her seductive daughter (Ankita Shrivastav, whose irritating act actually made me pine for Mallika Sherawat! Sigh…) to make them do so…
What’s hot:
Sirs, I have not been a huge fan of Welcome. The film was funny, but plotless, but it didn’t make me want to run out of the theatre. But this film was urging me to do so in each and every scene. But I didn’t, sirs, and it’s all due to the efforts of three gifted men – Anil Kapoor, Nana Patekar and Paresh Rawal. I could really see how hard they are struggling on screen to save as many scenes as they can with their superb comic flair. Sirs, my heart went out to them, seeing their unrelenting efforts to save a film that was simply gripping out of their hands. I also must admit, sirs, that I have chuckled at a couple of jokes here and there, though not a single scene made me hold my stomach and go ROTFL!
What’s not:
Sirs, I now come to the point as to why I am writing this letter. Sirs, we are in the midst of the second decade of the 21st century; we have easy access to brilliant comedies like The Big Bang Theory and Modern Family. So if you think we will go crazy laughing at people flying in a sandstorm or playing antakshari in a graveyard (Though Anil Kapoor dancing to Ek do teen made me smile more out of nostalgia than anything else), you sirs are insulting our sense of humour. And the fate of Humshakals should teach you what happens when you take our sense of humour for a ride. Sirs, I heard you haven’t paid Anil Kapoor and Paresh Rawal their dues. I think your editor, cinematographer and composers haven’t been paid as well. Otherwise, nothing can explain that shoddy editing, dull photography and tasteless songs. A few scenes made me feel that I have been watching a Mithun flick of the ’90s (Not Gunda…That made me laugh more than I laughed here!) I have no clue why Akshay Kumar never made a return here, but if you think John Abraham channelling Salman Khan, Sanjay Dutt and Sunny Deol in his acting is comic, God bless your good hearts, sirs. Also, sirs, I haven’t cried for a long time, but a tear dropped from my eye when I saw the much respected Naseeruddin Shah making a fool of himself. Lastly, I have this question to you only, Firozji – what’s your obsession with deserts, swanky choppers and ATVs and silly CGI that you have to include them in every action comedy of yours, be it Awara Pagal Deewana, Deewana Huye Paagal or this…That absurd sandstorm in the end was the final nail in that imaginary coffin you have put your viewers in!
What to do:
In Welcome Back, you have inserted the scenes from the first film to build context to why this film exists in the first place. You shouldn’t have done that, ‘cos every viewer in the theatre is there because they enjoyed that film. Those scenes only made me pine to watch that film again, go to IMDB and increase its rating. As for this film of yours, sorry sirs, Welcome Back is NOT welcome at all!
A very fine day to you, sirs! This is my first open letter to anyone, so if you find my language coarse anywhere, please forgive me. I happened to watch Welcome Back today, and I need to vent my pent-up frustrations. But before I give you the reason why, let me give you an idea what I thought of your film…
What’s it about:
We are first re-introduced to Uday (Nana Patekar) and Majnu (Anil Kapoor) those loveable goons from the last film. Following the events of the last film, they have reformed and doing all white business. And they are craving for a wife as well! So far…so good….But picture to abhi baaki hai, and you sirs have to justify the existence of the sequel. So you bring a stepsister for Uday out of nowhere, using a flimsy and convenient plot-device of a tharki father (Nana Patekar again, insulting all South Indians and Shetty’s in a single scene!). That stepsister is Ranjana (Shruti Haasan, whose acting makes us wish Katrina Kaif should have got her National award for Welcome). Now she needs a hero and Paresh Rawal had agreed to give you dates out of his busy Lok Sabha schedule for some unknown reason. So you bring his Ghungroo character back and give him a stepson in Ajju (John Abraham), a dreaded goon in Mumbai, whose intro is in a bawdy item song and whose sidekicks openly leer at girls. Yup, you want us to accept him as a hero. We go along with the flow and do so. Now you make the dons’ sister fall in love with this Hulk in one of the most cringe-worthy scenes and later, song of the year. When her brothers realise that even Ajju was into bone-breaking business, they get angry and opposes the match, leading the hero to hitting their goons and challenging them openly. As our heads are still reeling by what’s going on with the plot, you sirs thought this madness is not enough and you bring in a blind don (Naseeruddin Shah, gulp!) and his charsi son (Shiney Ahuja, double gulp!). And since you thought Uday and Majnu prancing around in their ’50s is funny, you put in another subplot of a conniving mother (Dimple Kapadia, added to the cast when they couldn’t get hold of her son-in-law!) and her seductive daughter (Ankita Shrivastav, whose irritating act actually made me pine for Mallika Sherawat! Sigh…) to make them do so…
What’s hot:
Sirs, I have not been a huge fan of Welcome. The film was funny, but plotless, but it didn’t make me want to run out of the theatre. But this film was urging me to do so in each and every scene. But I didn’t, sirs, and it’s all due to the efforts of three gifted men – Anil Kapoor, Nana Patekar and Paresh Rawal. I could really see how hard they are struggling on screen to save as many scenes as they can with their superb comic flair. Sirs, my heart went out to them, seeing their unrelenting efforts to save a film that was simply gripping out of their hands. I also must admit, sirs, that I have chuckled at a couple of jokes here and there, though not a single scene made me hold my stomach and go ROTFL!
What’s not:
Sirs, I now come to the point as to why I am writing this letter. Sirs, we are in the midst of the second decade of the 21st century; we have easy access to brilliant comedies like The Big Bang Theory and Modern Family. So if you think we will go crazy laughing at people flying in a sandstorm or playing antakshari in a graveyard (Though Anil Kapoor dancing to Ek do teen made me smile more out of nostalgia than anything else), you sirs are insulting our sense of humour. And the fate of Humshakals should teach you what happens when you take our sense of humour for a ride. Sirs, I heard you haven’t paid Anil Kapoor and Paresh Rawal their dues. I think your editor, cinematographer and composers haven’t been paid as well. Otherwise, nothing can explain that shoddy editing, dull photography and tasteless songs. A few scenes made me feel that I have been watching a Mithun flick of the ’90s (Not Gunda…That made me laugh more than I laughed here!) I have no clue why Akshay Kumar never made a return here, but if you think John Abraham channelling Salman Khan, Sanjay Dutt and Sunny Deol in his acting is comic, God bless your good hearts, sirs. Also, sirs, I haven’t cried for a long time, but a tear dropped from my eye when I saw the much respected Naseeruddin Shah making a fool of himself. Lastly, I have this question to you only, Firozji – what’s your obsession with deserts, swanky choppers and ATVs and silly CGI that you have to include them in every action comedy of yours, be it Awara Pagal Deewana, Deewana Huye Paagal or this…That absurd sandstorm in the end was the final nail in that imaginary coffin you have put your viewers in!
What to do:
In Welcome Back, you have inserted the scenes from the first film to build context to why this film exists in the first place. You shouldn’t have done that, ‘cos every viewer in the theatre is there because they enjoyed that film. Those scenes only made me pine to watch that film again, go to IMDB and increase its rating. As for this film of yours, sorry sirs, Welcome Back is NOT welcome at all!
