De Taali

Director: Eshwar Nivas
Cast: Riteish Deshmukh, Aftab Shivdasani, Rimmi Sen, Ayesha Takia
Rating:
downshowrating=1
De Taali begins and ends with the mandatory versions of title track and throughout the intermediate runtime one wonders where to opt for a taali.
The opening number immediately establishes the friendship between Abhi (Aftab Shivdasani), Paglu (Riteish Deshmukh) and Amu (Ayesha Takia).Soon you are subjected to uncanny and unnecessary characters that do no good to the plot. Abhi���s father (Anupam Kher) seems to be more interested in his dog than his son. For redundant reasons, Paglu���s landlord (Saurabh Shukla) assumes him to be some Raja Pratap Singh on an undercover mission. And Abhi keeps falling in love with girls galore including a shoplifter (Hrishitaa Bhatt), a firebrand hottie (Anjana Sukhani) and a witch speaking to spirits (Neha Dhupia). All of the above have no relevance to the story.
As Bollywood luck would have it, the moment Amu develops feelings for Abhi, a new girl Kartika (Rimmi Sen) enters his life. Before you expect a typical Karan Johar love triangle to initiate, the movie takes an Abbas-Mustan twist as it turns out that Kartika is a con girl whose only concern is Abhi���s wealth.
Now Paglu and Amu have to save Abhi from the clutches of this vixen. They kidnap Kartika and keep her in house arrest. Only when you assume the film to gain momentum with this interesting premise, it suddenly goes off-track with a puzzling flashback account on Kartika���s past. It���s absolutely ambiguous on what the director intends to show hereon.
Kartika runs away from her frenzied family full of crazy characters. Her transition from a geeky nerd to a hot bird is as unconvincing as her love liaisons with a drunkard Devdas and a nutty professor. Was she turn a con-girl out of circumstances? The bridal chase in the climax sequence will have you scratching your head for an explanation. And finally when the director is unable to stretch the screenplay any further he opts for the most convenient conclusion with the con-girl having a sudden change of heart.
The film seems to be shot and edited in patches and the continuity lapses clearly show. The screenplay by Abbas Tyrewala has an exciting buildup but a weak and weird culmination. After a point of time, it simply takes your sensibilities for granted. The only redeeming factor is the few funny moments that the film serves in the initial reels before diverting to psychotic subplots.
Ayesha Takia puts up a confident act as the lovelorn friend but her puppy-fat keeps varying through the film. Despite her bizarre characterization, Rimmi gives an interesting shade to the grey streak of her character. Aftab is good as long as he lasts onscreen.
But it���s clearly for the impeccable comic timing of Riteish Deshmukh that you refrain yourself from ���giving gaali��� to this caper. Else it���s certainly not all that clap-worthy.
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