99 falls way short of a century.

Grade: C+

99

Indian Release Date: 15/05/09
CBFC Classification:  U/A
Running Length: 2 Hours 05 Minutes

Cast: Kunal Khemu, Soha Ali Khan, Boman Irani, Cyrus Broacha, Mahesh Manjrekar, Simone Singh, Amit Mistry, Vinod Khanna  
Director: Raj Nidimoru & Krishna DK
Screenplay: Raj Nidimoru, Krishna DK & Sita Menon
Music: Ashu, Roshan Machado, Shamir Tandon & Mahesh Shankar

 

*Spoilers ahead, proceed at your own risk!*

Finally after nearly five weeks of enduring trash disguised as movies, which got dumped in theatres owing to the paucity of more “worthy” releases due to the ongoing multiplex blackout by Bollywood, we had something to look forward to in the form of 99, which was advertised as a pretty nifty looking comic caper. Tying in with its plot which revolves around cricket the title is supposed to be an allegory for life and the people who wait at the edge, just one run shy of making it big. However the movie falls more than a few runs short of that landmark.

The movie starts in the year 1999, Sachin (Kunal Khemu) & Zaramud (Cyrus Broacha) are two small time hustlers who run a mobile phone SIM card scam but run afoul of the police and while on the run try to steal a car which belongs to a high level bookie by the name of AGM (Mahesh Manjrekar). As fate would have it, they end up crashing the car & owe AGM big-time. Due to their inability to pay AGM any form of remuneration, they end up working for him as recovery agents. One of their assignments includes recovering dues from Rahul (Boman Irani), a Delhi based banker with a huge gambling addiction. Rahul had earlier lost a lot of money he had bet on an India-New Zealand match and owes AGM nearly 20 lakhs. He’s also in trouble with a local Delhi bookie by the name of Kuber (Amit Mistry) & to compound his problems further, his marriage is on the rocks too, but his addiction to gambling shows no signs of dissipating any time soon. When Sachin & Zaramud turn up at his door step to collect the money, he naturally doesn’t have it & retorts to robbery at the bank in which he works so that he can lay a huge bet to earn more and pay off all his debts. Sachin & Zaramud end up taking the money but due to a twist of fate end up losing it & with nothing to show for other than the hotel bill to AGM they are forced to go back to Rahul and devise another plan to get the money back. The new plan which they come up with involves betting money on a cricket match between India & South Africa based on a tip from a match fixer JC (Vinod Khanna) whom Rahul has beaten handsomely more than a few times at poker. Pooja (Soha Ali Khan), a manager at the hotel where Sachin & Zaramud are staying, also gets thrown into the mix along with Kuber & a Bhojpuri actor who also owes AGM money. With all their plans in place and everything looking well set for the protagonists, things seem likely to end perfectly or do they?

For a movie which utilizes the “almost there” motif it sure does take it to heart in nearly all it’s aspects and then pulls them down further in a few more. It’s primarily made as a comic-heist flick and most of the comedy arises from the dialogues and banter between the principles, rather than situations or any physical comedy (though Cyrus Broacha does take up the onus of playing the monkey, running into lamp posts and spending an inordinate time in the bathroom). In giving more importance to the comic elements the basic setup for the heist is poorly laid and doesn’t even need mild introspection for it to come crashing down like a pack of cards. The finale itself may be full of twists and turns & to the uninformed viewer it might even come off as a great cinematic moment for the uninformed, but anyone even mildly aware or attentive would see the twist coming a mile away. Another complaint bout the climax was to do with the role of the police which is supposed to play an important link to real life events but was handled so shoddily that it literally makes a mockery of any investigative process, much less give any credibility to the ability and intelligence of the main characters involved.

* Spoiler Alert!, Skip the paragraph below if you don’t want to know any intricate details of the plot or the climax.*

In the finale, Zaramud goes and hands over a tape with recordings of JC, dealing with match fixing. Now which nut case would do so and expect the police to not pounce on him, or at least interrogate him properly? (Wouldn’t it be better just to mail the tape?) But even more funnily this is exactly what the cops end up doing, not only do they let him walk out without the least bit of information gathered about him or even listening to the tape, they even decide to immediately raid all the bookies in Delhi, just on the basis of a tape handed to them by some random guy who walked into a police station, without even conducting any real investigation about the authenticity of the tape. Even the fact that Rahul knows about JC’s bluff beforehand & doesn’t bother to discuss it one bit with any of his partners in crime is simply absurd, since he owes everyone big-time & its not his money that he’s gambling with in the first place. It’s almost like he wanted to surprise them (more likely the writers wanted to appear “oh so smart” to the audience), but a gambling addiction aside, the least he would have done is discussed it with his associates & would have made the tension during the match seem much more creditable and also his actions & explanation. Kuber’s and AGM’s fates seem equally illogical even though they do provide their share of laughs. Equally baffling was the convenience with which nearly everyone involved in the climax knows the location of the others involved, be its Kuber knowing where Rahul is, or the police knowing Sachin’s hotel as if everyone carries a tracking device or Delhi is the size of a playground.     

*Spoilers Over, continue reading the rest of the review.*

To fool the audience is one thing, but the moment you forget to use plot and simple logic within characters in the movie and try to directly manipulate the audience it seems more like a jerk-off than anything more & the movie just becomes a vapid series of twists and turns with no meaning or logic. It might excite and thrill those not looking for much but overall will hardly be memorable & that’s what the best of the heist flicks over the years have done, pulled off a last act which is still recounted with equal awe as it had been the first time we witnessed it.
    
The movie does try pretty hard in parts to setup some of the protagonists well and that’s needed for people we are supposed to care about, but with spotty & incomplete characterizations it was hard for me to be concerned with their fates even though I did enjoy their interactions.   
    
    The romantic track between Pooja & Sachin feels strained and built more for obligatory reasons than anything more, nor do Kunal Khemu & Soha Ali Khan display any chemistry together in their second outing after the tepid comedy Dhoondte Reh Jaoge.      

    The pacing is highly uneven in parts (the mid section especially dragged like hell) and the movie also ends up wasting far too much time on portions which have no consequence what so ever on the final result. The movie would have benefitted from having a shorter running length and more focused narrative and being able to build a form of real tension which is sorely lacking in the scenes during the climax.

    The cinematography & editing is pretty well done though nothing outstanding. The background score works in parts but doesn’t always compliment the action on screen. The songs are highly uninspiring & wouldn’t be remembered once the final credits roll. The dialogues are certainly witty and provide most of the real humor of the film. Special mention must be made of the simple yet effective opening credits sequence.

    The acting is one of the strong points of the film. Mahesh Manjrekar is in top form & effortlessly disappears into his character. He provides the maximum laughs & gets some of the best lines in the film. Boman Irani does well but Amit Mistry as Kuber is the real scene stealer. Kunal Khemu is well Kunal Khemu, more or less the same character he’s played in every movie. Cyrus Broacha still shows signs of stiffness & hasn’t really made the jump from the small screen to the big screen smoothly. Soha Ali Khan has a thankless role and plays it strictly by the numbers. One of the things which works in the film to a degree larger than most Hindi films is the spontaneity in the interaction between the characters.

    99 plays out like an innings in which the batting side plays at an uneven pace and then suddenly decides to go bazooka in the slog overs only to score runs through outside edges or mis-hits which sail over the wicketkeeper’s head. Yeah, they surely did score runs but there’s nothing impressive or remarkable about the way in which they went about it. The movie will provide a few laughs, maybe a few surprises and will also bore you in parts but since there is nothing else to watch this weekend in the theatres & hasn’t been for sometime, you might just be tempted to watch it. Is it worth it? My advice; if the ticket costs below 99 go for it, else wait for it to arrive on T.V. or DVD.

Final Verdict: A sporadically entertaining effort, which drops way short of 99, maybe somewhere around 49, is more like it.         

Grade: C+    

 

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