Written & Directed by Reema Kagti
Rating: **
So all right, This isn't your perfect guide to a successful marriage. But the honeymooning hijinks here make you wonder if weddings are planned in places far below heaven.
Reema Kagti's debut film has enough chutzpah to keep you purring at the blend of parody and pathos, Once you get into the narrative groove of these imperfectly matched couples riding into a hectic horny hilarious honeymoon in Goa, you're in for a minor treat.
The six couples are joined at the hip and the lip by some commanding inflexions that bind the people in a tongue that's easy to identify ...provided you've ever been married. Even if you haven't been on a honeymoon, get a load of these feisty honeymooners, feasting on the first flush of love romance sex and bickering on a trip that makes us smile for a mile and chuckle for a brief way too.
What really holds the film together are the players. Everyone from the commanding Shabana to the sassy Raima are out to have fun. And there're some picturesque whispers about how a marriage can go wrong at its startling start. Watch newly married husbands Vikram Chatkwal and Karan Kapoor getting attracted to each other while their respective wives scratch their heads wondering why the bed seems so dead.
Sassy, savvy and sometimes slippery....Deftly written scenes and lines carry the narrative forward with nimble savoir faire. Debutant director Reema Kagti knows her cinema with a prideful originality.
Whether sensitive (watch the sequence where Boman and Shabana check out his lost ancestral property in the concrete jungle of Goa) or plain wacky (watch Kay Kay lose his marbles to lead the entire cast in a trance dance on a dithering boat),you can't trace Honeymoon Travels back to any souce, pvt or public.
The performances are all almost uniformly believably and effervescent, Every actor works within his or her limited to create a portable universe of credible emotions. Kay Kay Menon and Raima as the timid husband and bindaas wife are particularly endearing.
And you simply HAVE to see Abhay Deol and Minissha Lamba do the Lambada to know they are made for each other...at least in this film. But you wish Kagti hadn't turned this made-for-each-the pair into Superman and Supergirl. For Chrissake, if Kagti wanted F-X she could have made Boman's wig fly into Amisha's fast-moving mouth.
Shabana and Boman create their own magic. Though considering their histrionic stature, you wish there was more space for them.The nimble editing allows no space to miss anything beyond the pace. Not breathless but brisk, Honeymoon ... moves on confident feet, It doesn't purport to make serious statements on the quality of life and marriage. Instead it tells you to loosen up about issues that would generally addresss large amount of tissues.
And you can start looking for a pun in that last sentence only when you stop having fun watching this breed-easy satire.
