I am a big Akshay Kumar fan and love him for his comic timing. The Housefull franchise has some of the most popular comedy movies in Bollywood. However, the recent parts have lost that charm and the comedy feels forced. Even actors like Akshay, Ritiesh, and Johnny Lever seem helpless in front of average scripts and poor dialogues. The latest Housefull 5 released last Friday with two different endings which was something unique. I watched the B part, and apart from the murder mystery element, the entire narrative looked bland. There was no character building and I kept wishing the plot stayed on finding who’s the killer.
Speaking of the storyline, a wealthy businessman named Ranjeet names his son Jolly, the successor for his 69 billion pound empire. However, three different people, Julius (Akshay Kumar), Jalabuddin (Riteish Deshmukh), and Jalbhushan (Abhishek Bachchan) claim to be the real Jolly. Not only this, Ranjeet is also killed in the beginning and we are kept guessing who is the murderer wanting his name in the will. There are some subplots as well. For instance, the three Jollys find that their girlfriends have been exchanged after the drinks were spiked. We also see Jackie Shroff and Sanjay Dutt as cops investigating the crime. All of it felt a bit stretched.
The movie tries to be funny and mysterious at the same time. The comedy is mostly slapstick and silly jokes, some of which worked for me, but others felt a bit too much or repetitive. Akshay Kumar again shines with his funny acting, but the other actors don’t get as many chances to stand out. What I didn’t like are too many below the belt jokes that are not suitable for a family movie. I wish they kept the comedy more natural and instinct based, rather than writing dialogues with a teenager’s humor. Also, the first half is very slow and unentertaining. Most of it goes into introducing the vast lineup of characters that just keep coming. The second half is a little more engaging.
Visually, the movie looks good with bright colors and a nice cruise setting. The background music is okay, but the songs don’t leave much impact and most of them are just what we heard in the previous movies. If I compare this to the initial Housefull movies, there was no character development, which made the storyline fall flat. I could not relate with any character, nor was I rooting for anyone. When the movie is so stretched, it doesn’t matter who is the killer anymore. You just want the movie to come to a decent climax. The murderer in the B part is definitely unpredictable and hard to guess. But again, the story introduces Bobby Deol as the real Jolly in the end, which doesn’t make any sense and doesn’t impact the story at all. I feel with better script and editing, they could have made the movie much shorter and entertaining.