Skits woven around the religious divisions between Hinduism and Islam, are a great concept for satire. The idea of a fictitious place called Bangistan, an island country divided geographically and politically into North and South is decent a storytelling gimmick as well. But for all its good intentions Bangistan loses the plot too often. A comedy is best enjoyed when it’s seamless, not when it’s making an effort to be funny.
And the film tries to be quirky. Bangistan the place is introduced in an animated scene, establishing it as a country where the Muslim community lives in the mountains and Hindus live at the shores. They’ve been lodged in an enmity since time immemorial and the only hope to save the country and restore peace is the duo of Skype and Smartphone friendly religious leaders. The Imam and the Hindu high priest decide to give a lecture at the 13th Annual World Religion Conference. Tom Alter plays the Imam. Pretty sure an Anglo Imam counts for some level of satirical genius. Moving on, that’s where Hafeez (Ritiesh Deshmukh) and Praveen (Pulkit Samrat) become the unlikely heroes of the story. Radicals from each community pick Hafeez and Praveen as suicide bombers to detonate a bomb at the Religion conference to be held in Krakow, Poland. So Hafeez transforms into Ishwarchand and Praveen adapts to become Allarakha. Comedy of errors begins.
This script would’ve been hilarious in a narration. But when these doped out ideas are documented on film, they seem less impressive. That’s generally how parody goes. Juvenile behaviour and lunacy become an easy way to evoke humour. But even that takes some guile. With Bangistan the gags are disjointed and there are glaring stereotypes. Yes, we get the idea that cinema like Jaane Bhi Do Yaro or Phas Gaye Re Obama was born from the audacity of irreverence. But screenwriting has a few sets of rules, ones that you can’t just mock. Having said that, the movie does have a lot of good ideas. The Chinese and Russian arms dealers selling bombs are fun. Ideas like Star*ucks and FcDonalds are hilarious. If only, there were more such moments of inspired writing.
The dampener is the laborious climax. It’s just a bizarre melange of cinematic liberties where everything pans out like a bad ’80s action movie. Characters keep disappearing, continuity keeps failing, the costumes and production values don’t match up. Spotting Darth Vader and Storm Troopers in the august company of the Pope, Rabbis and other religious pontiffs does seem like a cool idea. But push that in to a situation where the lead characters are having dead serious conflicts of life, death and faith and you’ve just misplaced a clever gimmick.
Riteish Deshmukh and Pulkit Samrat are capable performers, especially in comedy. But their deranged characters never allow the actors to live up to their potential. Pulkit’s on-the-edge aggressive Hindu role almost always seems over the top. Riteish’s docile Muslim youth with nervous and honest disposition is engaging at first. But it changes completely in the latter parts. Jacqueline Fernandez is wasted in an inconsequential special appearance.
At one point, the film becomes so blasé with its method that it actually becomes tedious. Pity, that director Karan Anshuman’s clever eye for detail and in-jokes are left in the lurch. This one could've been such a riot, it had so much promise.
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