Bollywood seems to be coming back full circle with its current crop of new directors with refreshing and truly "hatke" ideas. Farhan Akhtar, John Matthew Matthan, Rakesh Mehra, Vishal Bharadwaj, and now carving his own style, Rajkumar Hirani.
Lage raho munnabhai shares its far-reaching theme with its predecessor, a rip-roaring comedy in a somewhat unrealistic setting, but with a message hidden somewhere. In its sequel, Hirani takes on the daunting task of making Gandhism relevant in today's world. The product is extremely appealing because it does the one thing that none of the earlier movies featuring Mahatma Gandhi did. This movie brings down Mahatma Gandhi from the idealistic pedestal, projects him as a human being and makes his ideology relevant to the current social set up in extremely day-to-day happenings. In this aspect it shares its theme with RDB.
Munnabhai is upto his usual self, falling head over heels over a radio jockey without meeting her, and winning a contest on Gandhiji with his hilariously devious ways, orchestrated by his loyal sidekick Circuit. Thus starts the impossible clash between a gangster bhai and the austere bapu. Gandhism is taken out from books and statues and applied to everyday problems both convincingly and hilariously, until the bubble breaks for Munnabhai, only to make him realize that Gandhiji is in his heart, not in front of him, and he's been doing Gandhi's work without divine intervention.
Rajkumar Hirani performs the task of making Gandhiji both accessible and relevant quite remarkably. The movie, without being preachy, takes Gandhism to the masses through a gangster and his antics. This is his biggest win. With the main issue of Gandhism, he also takes on blind faith in numerology, astrology and the deteriorating conditions of the elderly and weaves them together nicely to create this second and unrelated episode in Munnabhai's life. While the first movie was almost all fun with some good messages here and there, this one is much more message-oriented while uncompromising on the fun and the mass appeal.
Sanjay Dutt as Munnabhai appears a tad lethargic as compared to the first movie. His body language is a bit sluggish and he appears more love-struck and "un-bhai-like" than the first movie. But what Dutt loses, Arshad Warsi gains. Arshad Warsi is simply superb in the film. His comic timing and immaculate dialogue delivery generates continuous laughter in the theater. This movie gives a bit more depth to his character instead of keeping him as the sidekick. Like him or not, but as far as comic timing and acting is concerned, he is the next Govinda. Vidya Balan looks pretty and performs satisfactorily. I only hope her career does not go the Gracy Singh way. Boman Irani is great as usual, showing his versatility in comedy and villainy alike.
Overall a good film with lots of laughs and light-hearted Gandhism :-)
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