"Mujhse Shaadi Karogi?" (Will you marry me?) Akshay Kumar and Salman Khan ask Priyanka Chopra in tandem in next week's love triangle.

Quite a 'marry'-go-round!

In Abbas-Mustan's "Aetraaz", Akshay Kumar and Kareena Kapoor play a happily married couple under stress when Akshay's boss at his place of work, Priyanka Chopra accuses him of rape after he turns down her sexual advances.

Elements of the Demi Moore-Michael Douglas erotic thriller "Disclosure"? You bet!

Bollywood is turning increasingly chic and urban. And what better excuse for a bit of urban thrills than a triangular tale? While triangles have been largely missing in the biggies which have gone by this year (from "Munnabhai M.B.B.S." to "Main Hoon Na" to "Lakshya" and "Yuva") many of the prominent forthcoming films are formatted as three cornered urban 'contests'.

If in "Aetraaz", Priyanka is the seductive femme fatale to Akshay Kumar, in David Dhawan's "Mujhse Shaadi Karogi" she's cast as the girl who Salman Khan and Akshay Kumar want to woo and marry. In Prawaal Raman's "Ghayab", which opened last fortnight, Ramman Trikha fights the 'invisible' rival Tusshar Kapoor for Antara Mali's hand.

And in Puri Jagannath's long-delayed love triangle "Shart", Tusshar woos both Amrita Arora and Gracy Singh. In Anees Bazmi's "Hum Do Hamare Ek", Govinda courts Raveena Tandon and Mahima Chowdhary.

In Ken Ghosh's "Fida", which opens in August, Kareena Kapoor has Shahid Kapoor and Fardeen Khan to choose from.

Interestingly, while the first half of 2004 hardly had any triangular films except "Murder" where Mallika Sherawat sneaked away from husband Ashmit Patel to meet lover Emran Hashmi, the second half of the year seem to have gone back to the old tried-and-tested tangle within the triangle.

Will any of these three-pronged tussles have the box office clout of the best-loved triangular dramas of the past like Mehboob Khan's "Andaz" in the 1950s, Raj Kapoor's "Sangam" in the 1960s, Yash Chopra's "Daag" in the 1970s, Mahesh Bhatt's "Arth" in the 1980s and Yash Chopra's "Dil To Pagal Hai" in the 1990s?

It is to be seen if any of the forthcoming films match up to the power of these earlier dramas.