Fruit & Nut

Absurd Comedy at its best in Indian context. Monica Gokhale, who works for the Bombay Heritage Society, has plans to revamp the city's old buildings. This goes against the wishes of Maharaja Harry Holkar, who wants to keep the buildings as they are. To stop Gokhale, Holkar has her kidnapped. However, she is rescued by Jolly Maker, an innocent and not very bright person. This not only brings fame to Maker, but it also angers Holkar, who decides to bomb the Secretariat building with the help of Khandar Zala. They also recruit scientist Vishwas Atmavishwas Pinakin to help them with their plan. Realizing what Holkar and Zala are up to, Gokhale reveals her true identity and joins forces with Maker to stop them from destroying the city.

I love Indian movies, Bollywood, parallel cinema, and regional. It takes a lot for me to give only one star. Jolly Maker (Cyrus Broacha) trips and stumbles his way through life, leaving a trail of chaos and wreckage in his wake of which he is only barely aware. He is so clueless that he can have an entire conversation with a person who is bound and gagged and not have it cross his mind that they might want help. This is mildly funny for about 15 minutes, and after that gets irritating. The villains of the piece are wacky and never remotely believable. They are reminiscent of villains from the Batman TV show. Probably this is meant as a spoof of all bad silly kidnapping/evil villain shows, but I did not find myself able to read it as something that was "so bad it's good." Instead, it was merely so bad it was bad. Really really bad.