SHOOTOUT AT LOKHANDWALA, review by Syed Firdaus Ashraf in REDIFF

Shootout: Very pakao

Director Apoorva Lakhia, teri life toh ban gayee.
First, you make pakao movies like Mumbai Se Aaya Mera Dost and Ek Ajnabee, and yet, all the heroes gives you dates. So now, you have made your third movie, Shootout At Lokhandwala.
Tereko paisa kaun deta hai itni pakao picture banane ke liye? Abey, thoda akal toh istamal karne ka tha Abhishek Bachchan ko lene se paile! Abhishek goggle pen ke aaya aur khali bike chalaya. Phir phone pe phone kiya aur baad mein kuch Khalistani terrorist log usko tapka diye.
Role khatam in two minutes.
Chal usko chhod. Tell me what was the Mumbai police doing? They were shooting terrorists but none of them had any bulletproof jackets.
Humlog kya gaon se aayle hai?
And what was Sanjay Dutt (playing Aftab Ahmed Khan) doing in the film? Khali lecture de raha tha. Woh kam tha kya, jo tu kissan-turned-actor Amitabh Bachchan ko le aaya screen pe lawyer ke roop mein. Such a bore!
All Suniel Shetty did in the film was abuse the media. He kept saying the media never writes about policemen dying in encounters. Abey Suniel, has any policeman ever died in an encounter?
Heroine ke naam pe tu Dia Mirza ko liya, to play a television reporter. Abey, Apoorva, tu kabhi TV news nahi dekha kya? Do TV reporters talk like the way she did? Thoda homework toh kar leta.
Neha Dhupia was pakao in her tiny role.
Aarti Chhabria, usko tu kya kapde pinaya tha? Chal kapde chod, item number mein sab chalta hai, lekin usko thodi acting karne ka scope toh dena tha.
Mumbai police mein rah kar Arbaaz Khan Urdu, Hindi and English literature jhad raha tha. Have you ever met such a mamu in real life? What was the need for his role to be like this?
Suniel Shetty needs some training in acting. Khali-pili hooshyari maar raha tha. Uski biwi chod kar chali gayi toh ghadi-ghadi public phone pe jaakar blank call kyon de raha tha?

Vivek Oberoi, who played gangster Maya Dolas, try mara acchi acting karne ki. But screenplay and story ke naam pe poori picture ki vaat laga di.
Amrita Singh, playing Vivek's mother, cannot seem to get her Marathi accent right.

Tum log aur pak nahin jao isiliye ek cheez sun lo: When the Mumbai cops storm the building where the gansgters are hiding, they come with gunfire, bombs and even a rocket launcher! Yet, the phone lines aren't jammed until the very end. Probably, the considerate director wanted his filmi gangsters to say their final goodbyes to their girlfriends.
Apoorva, ab ek phookat mein advice sun. Don't make a movie again. If you still want to make one, then don't cast so many actors. Poori khichdi banaya tune, kasam Ganpat ki.

Rediff rating: *1/2