KAAMYAAB

Red Chillies Entertainment and Drishyam Films’ Kaamyaab (UA) is the story of a character actor in Bollywood.

Sudheer (Sanjay Mishra) has worked for years as a character actor in Bollywood films, playing varied roles from a villain’s sidekick to a doctor. Although some of his film dialogues have become iconic, he has not been able to make a distinct identity of himself as he was never the lead actor in a film. This has left him bitter. He is also unhappy about how the director of his last film had cheated him by mixing two shots — of him doing push-ups, and a girl feigning love-making — to make it look as if he and she were indulging in sex.

Sudheer has never kept count of the number of films he has acted in and he is pleasantly surprised when he learns that he has been a part of 499 films. He is keen to touch the magical figure of 500 and for that, he approaches his casting director-friend, Gulati (Deepak Dobriyal).

Does Sudheer get his 500th film? What is the reaction of his married daughter when he decides to work in one last film, in view of his bad experience in the previous film?

Hardik Mehta has penned a story and screenplay which are about the film industry, its working and its typicalities. While people from the film industry may be able to identify with the characters and the milieu, the general audience which is not connected with the film industry would find it difficult to comprehend several things in the drama. Another drawback of the drama is that it lacks in emotions as it does not induce tears from the viewers’ eye. A screenplay of this kind of film should’ve made the audience cry for Sudheer but that doesn’t happen. This may be because Sudheer is shown to be pretty confident of himself and not really the one to take nonsense from anybody. Even Sudheer’s personal life fails to tug at the viewers’ heart-strings.

This is not to say that the story and screenplay have no plus points. Of course, there are some enjoyable and entertaining moments but the overall impact is not what it ought to have been. The drama, therefore, becomes one which will be appreciated by a thin section of the class audience and the festival circuit audience.

Dialogues, written by Radhika Anand and Hardik Mehta, are natural.

Sanjay Mishra does justice to the character of Sudheer and acts with conviction. Deepak Dobriyal provides light moments with a fine performance in the role of casting director Gulati. Sarika Singh makes her mark as Sudheer’s daughter, Bhavna. Akashdeep Arora leaves a fine impression as Shibu. Isha Talwar lends good support as the budding actress who lives in the same building as Sudheer. Avtar Gill provides lovely support as himself. Nasir Khan has his moments as the film director. Baby Kaurwakee Vashistha (as Sudheer’s grand-daughter), Manoj Bakshi (as the 1980s’ villain), Birbal (as himself), Devas Dixit (as Gulati’s assistant), Ramesh Goyal (as himself), Viju Khote (as himself), Liliput (as himself), Manmauji (as himself), Guddi Maruti (as herself), Anil Nagrath (as himself), Bachchan Pachera (as himself), Vikas Verma (as the film hero), Rafiya Khan (as assistant director), Mukesh Prajapati (as the bouquet delivery boy), Amitabh Shrivastava (as Nirmal), Devika Vatsa (as Gulati’s assistant), Pranav Joshi (as the production controller), Pavitra Sarkar (as the film cameraman), Gargi Patel (as the school principal), Simran Gangwani (as the school teacher) and the others are adequate.

Hardik Mehta’s direction is reasonably nice for a debut film. Rachita Arora’s music and Neeraj Pandey’s lyrics are so-so. Background music (Rachita Arora) could’ve been better. Piyush Puty’s camerawork is fair. Ravi Srivastava’s production designing is appropriate. Prashanth Ramachandran Jayalakshmi’s editing is quite sharp.

On the whole, Kaamyaab is more for the festival circuit and will, therefore, not do much at the turnstiles.

Released on 6-3-’20 at Inox (daily 2 shows) and other cinemas of Bombay thru PEN Marudhar Cine Entertainment. Publicity: fair in digital world. Opening: poor. …….Also released all over. Opening was below the mark everywhere.