An Indian businessman Batuk Patel(Boman Irani) has built an empire in London. His daughters – lovingly named Ganga, Jamuna and Saraswati(played by Jacqueline Fernandez, Lisa Haydon and Nargis Fakhri) – want to marry Sandy, Bunty and Teddy(Akshay Kumar, Abhishek Bahchchan and Riteish Deshmukh), who are as broke as they can be. The problem is Patel doesn’t want his daughters to get married at all.
But this premise is hardly the interesting part of the movie. It’s the dialogues.
Building on the earlier two films in the franchise, also written by Sajid-Farhad, Housefull 3 serves rambunctiously funny one-liners from the beginning, and sets a comfortable ground for the actors to tread.
New to the madhouse, Abhishek Bachchan eases into play with a little hand-holding from Kumar and Deshmukh. Coupled with some self-deprecating humour spun on members of his famous family, he brings his own brand of funny.
Just a reminder here: Abhishek has worked with Sajid-Farhad before in Bol Bachchan. So, the funny style isn’t new to Junior Bachchan.
Then there’s more to the literal jokes as the movie goes on: When Jacqueline talk about staying away from the limelight, we’re told, “Nimbu ki raushani se door raho”. Or when Nargis begins a story saying, “Lambi ghadi ke peeche” instead of long time ago, we laugh.
Sadly though, these lines stick out a little oddly and don’t go with the flow.
The other blip in the script is its plot repetition.
At 145 minutes, the directors have produced a comedy that skips along, but it’s Akshay Kumar who saves the day. The other actors could’ve been better utilised.
Though not as much of a riot as Welcome or Khiladi 786, you can count on the star-cast and the crazy set-up to give you a good time.