After delivering two back to back blockbusters in “Housefull 2″ and “Rowdy Rathore”, Akshay Kumar is hoping for hattrick with his next release “Joker”. But ironically film is directed by Farah Khan’s husband Shirish Kunder whose debut film as director “Jaaneman” tank at box office without a trace that too having Salman and Akshay in the lead.

Now his new offering “Joker” has something new to offer. According to Shirish, it is first comedy revolving around aliens. He essentially wanted it to be country’s first pathbreaking 3D film but thanks to some sense prevailed as UTV denied him permission to do so. Then Farah-Shirish tried another tactics where the song was leaked from the film, “I Want Fakhat You” though later we got to know that this song already went through change of lyrics. One more gimmick to create sensation around a poor product.

Film’s first look and trailer were revealed couple of days back and response from general audience was far from satisfactory. Few directors and industry experts whom I managed to speak in last couple of days were shocked to see such a letdown promo. It clearly looks like a sequel to couple’s earlier debacle “Tees Maar Khan”, directed by Farah Khan.

Not a single dialogue is humorous and not a single frame is exciting. Akshay dressed in dhoti-kurta is looking out of the place and film seems to heading for fall on the face. But this is not the whole point. If one remembers correctly, there was a film titled “Chintu Ji” starring Rishi Kapoor which was released in 2009. That film talked about a small village where Rishi, the son of legendary Raj Kapoor, decides to try his hand at politics, and to garner support, re-locates to his birth village, Hadbahedi. The village is located in an isolated area where most trains do not stop, and electricity is only available for about 6 hours a day. Misled villagers believe Hadbahedi will get popular and modernized, and decide to assist him with all their might. How Rishi’s ulterior motive comes out in the open and how film’s shooting spoils village’s atmosphere forms the rest of the story.

Anyone who has seen the first promo of “Joker” will be amused after reading the plot of “Chintu Ji”. It bears striking resemblance as here in “Joker”, Akshay Kumar tries to bring an unknown village Paagalpur (yup, thats the name of the village) on the map of coutry by creating a fake buzz around the village by claiming that there is alien activities around. Here another resemblance to “Tees Maar Khan” where a train robbery was staged with the help of villagers.

I am sure that Shirish Kunder will be ready with his typical brand of humor in order to reply these kind of questions. But the fact is that after making disastrous debut, he has not learnt a trick or two about making a hit film. “Joker” might take a good opening riding on the back of Akshay’s current box office form but film looks to struggle from there onwards. Bad promo, weird story line and that too lifted from another flop (though a decent film), 3D not 3D confusion, overdose of Akshay and Sonakshi’s pair-this looks like a perfect recipe of disaster.

I still hope for the best for film’s fate at box office as one hit films generate profit to everyone involve with the film but these are ominous signs and it already looks all downhill from here.

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