What happens when you take a contemporary topic like "reality shows", put in some wannabe punjabis(whose sole credit to their punjabi affiliatons lies in bhangra-rock)who specialize in the art of using unimaginably fowl language and actually are able to make it sound funny in the given context, take a socialite wanting her share of fame, an NRI woman wanting to be an actress and a data analyser?
You get " A Laugh Riot" all the way.and no not the regular ones wch revolve around 4 guys fighting for a girl and the situation thus generated in most bollywood films these days for which Delhi Times probably gets paid, to lable it as a laugh riot.this movie makes you wonder about the intelligence of humour and how one can find it at the most unexpected places.
Set in USA the story revolves around the event"DESI IDOL"-you guessed it the morphed version of Indian Idol.The theme and its peripheries are pretty much the same, but what adds spice to them are the characters:the candidates for this event.
So you have a 17year old girl-Preeti Patel from a Gujarati family whose nightingale like voice makes herpride of her family-whose eccentricities makes this movie funny.Then there is the WANNABE(NRI) INDIAN(actress?)-Sonia, the workaholic data analyst-Vikram and the wannabe Bhangra pop hooligan.
The specificities of Gujarati social and linguistic aspects dealt with in the movie in a subtly humourous way makes it a classic example of intelligent humour.from eating their own home-made Theplas in a restaurant to donning the name of their relation to the aspiring Desi Idol-Preeti at the back of their tshirts to wanting to eat"pure vegetarian snakes"umm snacks!(maybe this was a bit exaggerated)the movie shows different apects of people.The socialite-Shabana Azmi and her fire to show down her theatre artist rival Bubbles Sabharwal, The foreigner with an Indian connection-his love for bollywood and his Indian girlfriend and yes a contestant by the name of Osama who creates much stir in the character of the movie just by his name.
The ending had a feel good factor to the movie whether you can agree with the logic of it or not is a different matter.But then"just because some things don’t have a reason doesnt mean that they are unreasonable".
Humour can’t be explained, it has to be felt.Just grab the CD from the nearest outlet and watch it over the weekend.
Till then.