T-Series, Maddock Films and Bake My Cake Films’ Arjun Patiala (UA) is a comedy set in Ferozpur in Punjab.
Arjun Patiala (Diljit Dosanjh) gets the job of sub-inspector of police in Ferozpur police station under the sports quota. He is anything but rough and tough which his job requires him to be. His deputy, Onida (Varun Sharma), is a fun-loving guy. Soon, Arjun falls in love with the local television news reporter, Ritu Randhawa (Kriti Sanon).
Arjun’s senior, DSP Gill (Ronit Roy), tells him that he should make Ferozpur free of crime and criminals. Rather than weed out the criminals himself, the smart Arjun pits the criminals against one another so that they are either put behind bars after their showdown or get killed. Ritu is disgusted when she gets to know of Arjun’s modus operandi. She almost wants to call off her relationship with him.
Meanwhile, the corrupt MLA (Seema Pahwa) is waiting for all the criminals of Ferozpur to be wiped off so that she can then be the only corrupt one to hold sway over the area.
Does the MLA succeed in her evil designs? Does Arjun free Ferozpur of all criminals and crime? Do Arjun and Ritu unite in matrimony?
The film is designed as a spoof on Hindi films. It starts with a writer-director (Abhishek Banerjee) narrating a script to the producer (Pankaj Tripathi). The entire script of the writer-director unfolds as the film Arjun Patiala.
Ritesh Shah and Sandeep Leyzell have penned a pathetic story which is meant to be a comedy but which hardly succeeds in making people laugh. For one, the jokes are so poor that they often fall flat on their face. Secondly, since it is a spoof on Hindi films, many jokes are so industry-specific that except for those working in the film industry, nobody will understand them, leave alone enjoying them.
The duo’s screenplay is kiddish – and that’s putting it mildly. Logic has no place in this drama and it appears that scenes have been pieced together without caring for the final product. If the romantic part of the drama is devoid of excitement, the action part is quite lifeless, and the comic part, pathetic. In fact, as the drama unfolds, the audiences stare in disbelief, unable to understand what they should make of the proceedings. Everything appears so contrived and convoluted that it gets on the viewers’ nerves. In particular, the scenes showing Arjun and/or Ritu and/or Onida intoxicated are irritating to the core. Even the scenes of person after person dropping the door to the floor hardly create comedy although that’s the intention. Dialogues, penned by Ritesh Shah and Sandeep Leyzell, are not half as funny as they ought to have been.
Diljit Dosanjh tries to rise above the inane script by doing his job sincerely. He acts well except in his scenes of drunkenness, in which his style of talking is far from funny. Kriti Sanon looks pretty and acts ably as Ritu Randhawa. Varun Sharma is earnest in the role of Onida and manages to evoke laughter at places. Ronit Roy is alright as DSP Gill. Seema Pahwa makes her presence felt as the corrupt MLA with a heartfelt performance. Mohd. Zeeshan Ayyub is quite nice as Sakool. Sumit Gulati (as Anda), Akshay Joshi (as Kala Jamun), Amit Mehra (as Baldev Rana), Himanshu Kohli (as Dilbaugh Singh) and Yogesh Upadhyay (as Danda) lend ordinary support. Ritesh Shah is okay as Arjun’s father. Nirmal Rishi leaves a mark as Arjun’s mother. Pankaj Tripathi gets limited scope and is natural in a special appearance (as the film producer). Abhishek Banerjee is alright in a special appearance (as the writer-director). Sunny Leone is good in a special appearance as Baby. Mithilesh Chaturvedi (as Bhatia), Ankush Kulshreshtha (as Kundan), Manvendra Tripathi (as Dalbir Singh), Tajender Singh (as Gagandeep Mehra), Pradeep Singh (as Ajeet Singh), Rajeev Tiwari (as the doctor), Jaspal Sandhu (as ASI Kartar), Nikita Grover (as Ritu’s assistant), Shubashish Ghosh (as the bad guy), Gulshan Suryavanshi (as the bad guy), Bharat Bhatia (as Sukhi Bajwa), Gurmeet Chawla (as the jailor) and Anup Sharma (as the prison guard) lend routine support.
Rohit Jugraj’s direction is weak. He has just not been able to create the fun required to be created in a comedy. Sachin-Jigar’s music is quite nice. ‘Main deewana tera’ is a well-tuned song. The other songs are also appealing but not a single song is hit. Lyrics (Guru Randhawa, Jigar Saraiya and Priya Saraiya) are fairly good. Vijay Ganguly’s choreography is okay. Ketan Sodha’s background music could’ve been better. Sudip Sengupta’s cinematography is decent. Vikram Dahiya’s action and stunt scenes are not as thrilling or exciting as they should’ve been. Parijat Poddar and Shekhar Ujjainwal do an ordinary job of the production designing. Krishna Swain’s art direction is okay. Huzefa Lokhandwala’s editing is not as sharp as was needed.
On the whole, Arjun Patiala is a poor comedy which will throw up tragic box-office figures all over.
Released on 26-7-’19 at Regal (daily 1 show) and other cinemas of Bombay thru AA Films. Publicity: so-so. Opening: very poor. …….Also released all over. Opening was weak everywhere.