By Martin D'Souza, Bollywood Trade News Network

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As the title suggests, DHAMAAL is great fun. The comedy is not over-the-top and performances from the actors not loud. All blend into one to carve out a rib-tickling flick. Director Indra Kumar exploits the potential of the actors to time their comedy to a nicety. What you get is what you see, and what you see leaves you in splits! More importantly, the director does well to carry off this film without a female interest.

Ashish Chowdhary (Boman), Riteish Deshmukh (Roy), Arshad Warsi (Aditya) and Jaaved Jaffery (Manav) are four distinct characters, all friends in search of the proverbial pot of gold. Sanjay Dutt (Inspector Kabir Nayak) is the cop who stumbles upon their secret and Asrani (Nari Contractor) is Ashish’s dad who brings the house down with his Parsi act.

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Comedy for Ashish is a first-time effort and he comes out trumps. Riteish is now making this genre his forte while Arshad, Sanjay and Jaaved are no strangers to clowning around. Jaaved as the buffoon is hilarious and his improvisation in dialogues goes with his body language. However, the scene where he has his hands stuck in the back pocket of another gent at the cash counter in a department store, who then visits the toilet, is a straight lift from one of the episodes of MR BEAN. But full marks to Jaaved for carrying off the scene with aplomb.

There are many instances where the jokes have been heard before, but the improvisation is laudable. Like the scene when the four try to sell off a painting with the horse eating grass and end up with a blank frame. “The horse ate the grass.” they say, “and he left soon after,” explaining the painting. We all heard that one. But then Jaaved tells the befuddled gent, “Don’t worry, when the grass grows again, the horse will come back!”

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Or the scene where Arshad is begging Sanjay to let them go, all the while collecting dust in his hands which he then flings into thin air. “I too have seen Sholay,” says Sanjay from behind him. Also, the scene where they do daredevil stunt to cross a broken bridge that leaves the car in flames.

On the flip side, while the first half is crisp, the second half stretches. Twenty minutes clipped off from here and it would have made a huge difference. Also, the ending is a bit melodramatic. The movie could have ended with the bag of money being carried away in the hot air balloon.

But this is a seriously funny movie. Go for it; rest assured its DHAMAAL all the way.

Ratings: 3/5