Om Jai Jagadish

Om Jai Jagadish **

MAIN CAST
Anil Kapoor -- Om
Fardeen Khan -- Jai
Abhishek Bachchan -- Jagadish
Mahima Chaudhry -- Ayesha
Urmila Matondkar -- Neetu
Tara Sharma -- Puja
Waheeda Rehman -- Saraswati

BASIC PLOT OVERVIEW
There isn't much in the way of plot for the first 2/3 of this movie, so I'll summarize the best I can: Om, Jai, and Jagadish are three brothers who live with their widowed mother. They travel a variety of different paths, but eventually come back together when some rich guy threatens to take away their beautiful villa at the sea. (Look, I tried. There isn't a whole lot of substance here.)

FILM -- 2/5
There are a lot of slightly-different versions of the same scene pasted together, ie, a character dancing in an elevator is shown in a cut going up, then a cut going down, back and forth and back and forth. It's not really bad--its a common device in films to show a bunch of cuts when you're filming silly scenes--but OJJ uses the trope in excess. That being said, there's some really good, smooth camera work; I really liked the opening scenes of everyone moving about the house. The writing is the opposite, though, and while the camera work flows like water, the dialogue is choppy and the plot tends to meander about aimlessly. You actually don't run in to much of interest storywise until the end of the film. A lot of the scenes are super-cute, though, and I didn't completely hate the costuming or the choreography.

CHARACTERS -- 2.5/5
Fardeen Khan's Jai is a sweet little golden boy, a young college student who dreams of creating the world's fastest car and is blatantly tied to his mother's apron strings. He's so good he's saccharine, and since he's attending college outside of India, he is often accompanied by really bad white actors. Anil Kapoor is equally good, but in a different way: Om is a law-abiding, preachy, bound-to-traditions type of character who is so insistent on sticking to the book that he starts to grate on you. It wouldn't be so bad if Om or Jai's goodness was taken down a few notches, but the two of them combined really start to grate on you after a while. Jagadish is a more tolerable character, a teenager who is motivated by boyish naivete rather than a grandiose plan to better himself. I still don't care much for Abhishek's dancing, but I'll give him his props: at least he tries! I inititally disliked Mahima's character, a girl named Ayesha who VJs an Indian version of MTV's Punked, but she's so goddamn beautiful and charming that I can't entirely hate her. Besides, her upbeat attitude really softened Om's character and made him grow on me, so hurrah! Newcomer Tara Sharma was kind of cute, provided the make-up artist didn't go too crazy on her face, but she was a bland actress and didn't impress me much. Urmila Matondkar* is a good match for Jai because their characters do the same two things: look adorable and let their halos shine. In a general sense, this cast is loaded with stars who tried hard, but didn't really cut it in the end. Another downside is that there are many incredibly close male bonds depicted, but there are no developed relationships between the women of the film. Hence, the female characters are even more 2-dimensional than the male characters.

SOUNDTRACK -- 1.5/5
The opening interpretation of "Om Jai Jagadish" didn't wow me, but it was still a lovely version of an old favorite with truly beautiful vocals. The song Jagadish and Ayesha dance to is an upbeat dance tune that will really only interest you for the first verse or two, after which point it gets very repetitive. "This Is Our Love Story" sounds like something on a 90s adult contemporary station, and not in a good way. The only song I really enjoyed was "Happy Days," which was kind of stupid, but still fun. There's an obnoxiously sweet song the whole group (minus Puja) sings about how love is equal to holiness that earns a few bonus points for having nice vocals and a great drum beat. I don't remember much else about the soundtrack, because it was as unremarkable as the script. The songs don't flow very well, either, and they tend to pop out at the most inopportune moments.

OVERALL -- 2/5
Om Jai Jagadish pales in comparison to better films in many arenas. It lacks a great script, its star-studded cast performs poorly, and the soundtrack is barely passing decent. The plot doesn't pick up until the last half hour or so while the rest of the film meanders. That said, Om Jai Jagadish exudes a surprising amount of heart. It's obvious that, for all of its technical faults, the film never lacked love from the people making it. I won't watch Om Jai Jagadish much, and I doubt it'll become anybody's favorite movie, but it's worth a rainy-day viewing if you like any of the three male leads. Otherwise, give Om Jai Jagadish a pass.

TOTAL SCORE -- 8/20 (mediocre)




* And of course, Urmila Matondkar's character is an NRI, so they have to turn her in to an obnoxious bitch. It's rather annoying; I could smell the obsessive patriotism coming from a mile away. Jagadish even gets to lecture her on how "un-Indian" she is while she complains in a way few NRIs really would.

** Om Jai Jagadish is the name of the three male leads, but it also refers to the opening line of certain Hindu devotional songs.