Movie Review: Maan Gaye Mughall-E-Azam

After Pyaar Ke Side Effects the pair of Rahul Bose and Mallika Sherawat is back to entertain the audience once again, with the film ‘Maan Gaye Mughal-E-Azam’. An out and out comedy, the film is directed by Sanjay Chhel. The movie has been produced by Ganesh Jain and Ratan Jain, under the banner ‘Venus Records & Tapes’. While Anu Malik is its music director, Sanjay Chhel provided the lyrics. Other then Rahul and Mallika the star cast of the film include Paresh Rawal, Kay Kay Menon, Pawan Malhotra and Zakir Hussain.

The movie starts with a preventable prologue about the 93 riots in India, when the demolition of Babri Masjid shook the roots of India, and pointlessly places the film’s story in the bygone era. During this time, we are taken to a small town near Goa, known by the name of St. Louise. The coastal town is being used for smuggling in things like RDX and Arms and has been put on high alert, with Police, CBI and raw officers being stationed there. There exists a theatre group in St. Louise, known by the name of Kalakar Theatre Company. Shabnam (Mallika Sherawat) is the lead actress of a drama company, playing Madhubala’s role in staged Mughal-e-Azam shows. Her husband Mazumdar (Paresh Rawal) is old enough to play her father-in-law Akbar in the drama. Arjun (Rahul Bose), a daily spectator of their show, is mesmerized by this Madhubala. The director wishes to waste no time in establishing their love story.

The group of actors of the drama company who love their work, but are tired of doing the same age old period play 'Mughal-E-Azam' every time. Life is going on smoothly for them and they are busy in their own dreamy world of acting. This bliss comes to an end when they come to know that Arjun is an undercover cop on a mission, though he seems to indulge in duty only by fluke, and about the plan of an underworld don, of creating havoc in the country by causing severe bomb blast.

This is when their life takes a different turn and they go on an amusing and adventurous roller-coaster ride. All the members of the drama company devise a ‘deadly game plan' to help Arjun for his mission and save the country from the tremors of the bomb blast.

MAAN GAYE MUGHALL-E-AZAM takes time to come into form. But when it does, the humor is unstoppable. In fact, the audiance will reverberate with wild laughter at several places. But the continuity in screenplay is seriously lacking in the movie.

Last but not the least, Paresh Rawal, though pretty loud, serves as the only saving grace of the film. Moving on to Mallika Sherawat, she hardly knew acting before also, but this time even her cleavage failed to create any ripples. Kay Kay Menon was completely miscast in the movie, while Pavan Malhotra was wasted. However, what we were left wondering is how the much-talented Rahul Bose could be in such a movie.