/> Starring Sanjay Dutt, Riteish Deshmukh, Arshad Warsi, Javed Jaffry, Aashish Chaudhary, Asrani
Directed by Indra Kumar
Rating: **

What do you do with a film that's the movie –experience version of a bratty child who insists on getting his white shirt all muddy while playing cricket outside and then smiles so sweetly at your frowning face, you melt.

Dhamaal is so silly and goofy, you want to reprimand the people who are falling off their chairs all around you for laughing. Instead you will-nilly find yourself joining the mindless merry-making in this all-boys' film, with just two incidental female characters to avoid charges of a gender bias.

For the rest, Dhamaal moves with the insistent clamour of a do-or-die stag party. The economy of expression is admirable. Director Indra Kumar hasn't even left any space for songs.

Although the parodic product purports to be a hectic hilarious harangue on the cult of humbug, there're humbug in the 'humbug' genre that Indra Kumar cleverly skirts....or considering the film's benign misogyny. should I avoid reference to skirts and other women's apparel?

Dodging overt vulgarity, keeping the pace slick rather than sick, introducing characters in the tradition of the wacked-out road movies in 1960s featuring Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr, Dhamaal is fun to watch, more than partially because of the chemistry that the quartet of fun-seeking dhoom-mates share with a flair for the funnies.

Throw in Sanjay Dutt as the most disheveled cop on this side of Dirty Harry, and you have got a comic brew that bubbles over with broad satire.

The ongoing gags are like extended jokes from tv skits. But the skits are never on the skids, even when the focus shifts from the grownup kids to actual kids.

The second -half when the foursome scampers to Goa is specially frenetic in pace. 'Fuel' marks to editor Sanjay Sankla for proving energy to the gasbags in the Goan goings-on.

And 'fool' marks to the cast for getting so blissfully clued-in to the hi-jinks.

Riteish, a little out of sorts in his last boys-will-be-noise outing in Hey Babby sparkles in earnest temptation specially in the scenes where he's chased by a droll dacoit (Sanjay Mishra).

Aashish Choudhary as a goofy Parsi slapped incessantly by his father Asrani, is also a delightful comic revelation. But what happened to the habitually brilliant Arshad Warsi? He seems so disinterested in the laughathon! Too many crroks spoilt Arshad's broth?

By the time the cast pants and puffs to the location of the intended treasure in Goa, the narrative has just about run out of steam.

For once a boys' comedy knows where to stop. Freed of the raunchy double meanings of Indra Kumar's Masti, Dhamaal is the kind of film where you can put your feet up and sink your teeth into without wanting to wince with embarrassment.

But a no-brainer? Sorry, Pappa! Not dumb.