Aga Bai Areychaa 2

Director – Kedar Shinde

Cast – Sonali Kulkarni, Bharat Jadhav, Milind Phatak, Dharam Gohil, Surabhi Hande

A remedy for a director, to cover up for a shit script, is to try and convince that his present work is a continuation of his past. The past in such cases is denotes sheer brilliance. However, this ‘intelligent’ method of escapism by Kedar Shinde won’t be enough to fool the audience as his film ‘Aga Bai Areychaa 2’ is irritative and amateurish.

On the advice of his publisher, struggling writer Vikram Desai approaches Shubhangi Kudalkar (Sonali) to put her life on paper. Taken aback, she refuses at first but later decides to narrate her story. A series of events (since childhood) have made her believe that anyone who reciprocates her love will face an accident. This is the reason for her being single. Is this a curse or an assertion? Does she ever get married? You can predict the rest.  

The protagonist continues to remain childish even after multiple courtships. There’s no maturity in love. It’s like watching a 60’s film. Kedar Shinde extends the second half unnecessarily to show problems of Shubhangi’s martial life. Had he taken the same efforts in direction which he took to change his name (it became ‘Kedaarh’ in ‘Toh Baat Pakki’ and recently ‘Kedhar’) this film would have provided some solace.

The producers decided to borrow the YashRaj method of underpayment which is why you see the actors disinterested in making their presence count on the screen.  If there was a Marathi version of the ‘Golden Kela Awards’ (Indian equivalent of the Razzies) then I would like to nominate Sonali Kulkarni for the Worst Actress in Marathi for 2015. Overacting is a small word when you see Bharat Jadhav and Prasad Oak make mockery of themselves. Milind Phatak is the only saviour in this film.

You can’t believe your eyes when you see Dilip Prabhawalkar credited as one of the dialogue writers. In a scene Shubhangi gets hurt and her lover can’t touch her. He takes the help of a delivery boy who is promised a ‘rakhi’ for his help. He responds by saying, “mala Rakhi bandhayla bolavtay... ani mazha naav Sawant aahe.’ Would you dare to laugh at such a lame remark? (A silly Makrand Anaspure joke is preferable!)

This film doesn’t even have the slightest connection to its prequel ‘Aga Bai Areychaa’. Even though it was copied from ‘What Women Want’ it had its moments of fun. The sequel sucks in every department. Music by Nishaad is pathetic. You terribly miss Ajay-Atul. A song after every segment or two gives you the same vexed feeling of ‘What’s Your Rashee’ (even that film had entertainment in the form of ‘Gareebon Ka Hrithik’ Harman Baweja).

I’m going with a generous one out of five stars for ‘Aga Bai Areychaa 2’. The 120 rupees wasted in seeing this film could have been invested in buying a Tuborg Strong Beer bottle.