Tees Maar Khan

'Tees Maar Khan', or Tabrez Mirza Khan (Akshay Kumar) is one of the most wanted robbers of India (they insist he's a criminal but he's really only a thief). He's aided by his annoying cronies Dollar, Soda & Burger. He's hired by the Johri brothers (MTV's Raghu & Rajiv) to rob a train that's carrying 10,000 kgs of antiques worth several crores from Mumbai to Delhi. Since he can't steal all that stuff by himself, he stages a fake movie production where he convinces residents of an entire village to help rob the train. To lend credibility to his movie idea, he convinces his girlfriend Anya, a struggling B-grade actress (Katrina Kaif), and Atish Kapoor (Akshaye Khanna), an Oscar crazed actor, to act in the movie.

The thing is I love Farah Khan's movies. They're silly and have their fair share of laughs, emotions, comedy, drama and action. They're complete entertainers. And mercifully, they are devoid of the kind of toilet humor one associates with her brother Sajid Khan's movies.

With 'Tees Maar Khan' (TMK) however, Farah Khan has let herself and her audience down. And all for love - had she kept the story and screenplay departments to herself instead of making her husband incharge of them, she would have had a winner on her hands. For TMK is quintessential Farah material. It has a plot that's bordering on insane and offers ample scope for spoof, something she revels in.

As it stands though, TMK is a directionless movie that ambles along for 2 hours before suddenly deciding to sputter out a lame climax. The much hyped train robbery turns out to be mindnumbingly uncomplicated.

Some of the gags in the movie are in really bad taste - jokes on dark skinned people and albinos being paraded as Britishers. And the product placements! Gaaaaaaah! They're too in-your-face.

For all the negatives, TMK also has a few positives.

To begin with, Farah Khan is back to doing what she does best - spoof the movies of the 1970s. TMK grows up to be a thief because his mother watched a lot of "chor-police" movies while she was pregnant with him. For good measure, his dad also happens to be a cop.

Then there are the spoofs on celebrities. If 'Om Shanti Om' took off on Manoj Kumar, TMK pokes fun at SRK (Akshaye Khanna is constantly regretting letting go of Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionnaire). There are jokes on Danny Denzongpa and Manoj Tiwari. And there is the song 'Mere Desh Ki Dharti', which I thought was a master stroke!

Finally, there's the typical Farah Khan happy ending and the credits where everyone involved in the making of the movie, right from the actors/ director/ producer to the technicians and spot boys get to smile and dance in front of the camera while the song 'Everybody loves a happy ending' plays in the background.

Farah Khan manages to get Katrina Kaif to act AND dance. This is Katrina's best performance till date. She plays the role of a drop dead gorgeous bimbo with aplomb. She bounces around and over-acts as she's required to do, in a role where her dialogues are mostly confined to "important scene hai, aur make up lagao" and the likes. Even the way she yells 'Tabreeeeeez' and calls him a "meanie" will make you laugh. And she burns the screen in 'Sheila ki Jawani'. The song looks way hotter on the big screen than it does on TV (there's even a tribute to 'Jumma Chumma' in there...yay!!) and Katrina Kaif has got herself a mind blowing body. At least I think so. The Boy would like her to get her boobs back.

Akshay Kumar does a better job here than he has in his recent movies. He's restrained and funny. I can't think of any other actor who would've suited this role better than him. But he's pulled down by poor dialogues, courtesy Shirish Kunder once again.

It's Akshaye Khanna who gives us the most number of laughs as the actor who's so desperate for an Oscar, he'll do any movie by anyone who claims to be a hot-shot Hollywood director, without even checking his/her credentials or hearing the script!

Raghu Rajiv have made complete asses of themselves in the movie. No one's going to take them seriously in Roadies anymore!!

TMK is better than the 'Heyy Babys' and 'No Problems' of the world but compared to what one expects of Farah Khan, it's a let-down. The story had so much potential for her to just take off on but she was let down by a poor script, poorer humor and pathetic dialogues. I can just hope that the next time she sets out to make a movie, she realizes the importance of keeping her personal and professional relationships separate.