Jagga Jasoos
Year: 2017
Director: Anurag Basu
Cast: Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Saswata Chatterjee, Saurabh Shukla

Director Anurag Basu teams up with Ranbir Kapoor to try and recreate their Barfi chemistry, which got rave reviews. Like Barfi, this time, too the inspiration is from West. Described by Basu as the ‘first ever attempt to present a Hollywood-like musical to Indian audiences’, Jagga Jasoos is an experiment that is backed up by a no lesser banner than Disney!

What’s the plot?

An orphan boy finds a sympathizer-cum-surrogate father, who helps him overcome a bad stammering habit by teaching him to communicate through songs. The ‘father’ then admits his ‘son’ into a boarding school, where he grows up to be a private investigator with an eye to spot a developing mystery. As he keeps cracking mysteries in his vicinity, he stumbles upon a young lady scribe, who is investigating an aerial drop of an arms cache in a small town. Now together they have to solve a much more complex case, that of his missing foster-father, which will take them to exotic foreign locations and involve facing the wrath of corrupt secret service agents and dangerous arms dealers!

What’s hot?

·        Basu sincerely attempts to make a ‘Hollywood-like musical’. He keeps the tone peppy and light-hearted.

·        Ranbir Kapoor, donning Tintin- looks, brings his charm and talent to make the hero likeable.

·        Katrina Kaif proves a good foil.

·        Saswata Chatterjee as the foster-father and Saurabh Shukla as a corrupt secret agent are good in supporting roles.

·        Amitabh Bhattacharya’s lyrics/dialogues, Shiamak Davar’s choreography, Pritam’s music and excellent production/technical values give a colourful comic-book look to this musical.

What’s not?

·        The mystery plots could have been better written.

·        At three hours, the film is too long and keeps losing its grip time and again.

·        Perhaps a full-fledged Westernized musical is a bit too much to accept for Indian masses. A mix of ‘normal’ and musical dialogues could have worked better at the box-office.

·        The hero- heroine romantic chemistry need not have been kept at the subtle, suggestive level till the end. An awkward, goofy romance could have added fun and charm to the narrative.

Verdict

Both, Anurag Basu and Ranbir Kapoor need to be lauded for taking such a risk to make this kind of a musical. They give it their all to their experiment. Unfortunately the treatment of the film is too different and distant for the mainstream audience. Also any detective story needs a tighter, intriguing script and there the film comes up short. Overall, Jagga Jasoos is a good one time watch but nothing more than that!

Rating

2.5 stars