For some strange reason, all through The Legend of Michael Mishra , I was closely following the antics of the extras: in the crowd scenes, in the song-and-dance routines, and as listeners in the central narrative tool of Boman Irani telling us the rather protracted backstory of Michael Mishra.
The overenthusiastic, unintentionally funny acts in the sideshow betray a total lack of control by the director with what he had in hand. Forget the actors on the margins: he doesn’t even seem to have supervised the core of the film, its script.
Clearly there’s a lot that slips between ambition and intent and the absolutely amateurish execution of it onscreen. The director probably would have had lofty dreams, that of spinning a quirky and whimsical film. Where the simpleton tailor hero (Arshad Warsi) accidentally kills a don and becomes a kidnapper. He falls in love with a girl (Aditi Rao Hydari), especially with the way she says hello, goes to the gallows to reform himself and becomes a tailor back again. It’s a different matter that he gets back to the sewing machine only to stitch some ghastly baba suit-like uniforms for himself and the other prison inmates. I am sure that they’d have preferred death sentence to being stuck in those clothes the rest of their lives.
Things steadily go from the dull and unfunny to downright idiotic and ridiculous. The hero eats some 200 green chillies in a competition with his eyes turning red and blood oozing out of his nose, all to prove his love for the heroine.
Despite the heavy duty title, the film plays out so flat and lifeless that the viewer couldn’t care less. What you get in the name of whimsy is sheer inanity, boredom and irritation. Some Groucho Marx masks may have been worn by the characters in a couple of the scenes in the film, but that doesn’t lend the film any of Marx’s crackling humour.
The film’s backdrop is Bihar, a tacky one at that, where people spew lines like “ Kutwa pipewa mein phans gawa hai (the dog is stuck in the pipe)”. No, don’t ask me to elaborate on the context please. Warsi looks totally disinterested as Michael, sleep walking through the film. Then there is the ladylove, Rao Hydari who smiles in ditzy fashion and dances weirdly to a song which is about the spelling of cow. C.O.W. No, I am not joking. It’s the film that is a big joke.
The Legend of Michael Mishra
Director: Manish Jha
Starring: Arshad Warsi, Aditi Rao Hydari, Boman Irani, Kayoze Irani
Runtime: 124 mins
