Andaz Apna Apna - Ailaa!! Oeemaa!!! Kya picture hai!!!

Movie - Andaz Apna Apna (Hindi)
Director - Rajkumar Santoshi
Producer - Vinay Kumar Sinha, Shanti Sinha
Cast - Aamir Khan, Salman Khan, Raveena Tandon, Karishma Kapoor, Paresh Rawal & Paresh Rawal, Shakti Kapoor, Shehzad Khan, Viju Khote, Mehmood, Jagdeep, Tiku Talsania, Javed Khan, Govinda, Juhi Chawla
Music - Tushar Bhatia
Background Score - Viju Shah
Cinematography - Ishwar Bidri
Editing - VN Mayekar
Art Direction - R Verman
Story, Screenplay - Rajkumar Santoshi
Dialogues - Rajkumar Santoshi, Dilip Shukla
Release Date - 11th April 1994




Well, Rajkumar Santoshi's Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani tempted me so much to watch Andaz Apna Apna again. So as soon as I got home from that movie, I searched for my DVD and played it on and had a fantastic time watching AAA for the nth time. It is probably the best comedy made in Hindi so far, it has achieved a cult status and has a huge base of loyal fans. Rajkumar Santoshi who had made the hard-hitting social dramas Ghayal and Damini earlier, made a departure from his earlier style in this film.

Thus we get an assortment of mad, crazy, zany, stupid, dumb, filmy and whacky characters and yea, even madder character names. There are the heroes Amar and Prem resembling the name of an old Rajesh Khanna starrer. Raveena and Karishma, named as their own selves. Anand Akela, Bhalla and Robert, Ram aur Shyam Gopal Bajaj and the best of all, Mogambo ka bhateeja, Crime Master Gogo. All of them together make this movie a roller-coaster ride, right from the opening credits which misspells the name of each member of the cast and crew deliberately to the climax fight at Crime Master Gogo's den. The movie moves at such a fast pace that you dont even get time to think how illogical it is. And ya, it is illogical, but that is the USP of this crazy movie. 


The story is so crazy that it is very hard to summarize. But still, I'll try. Amar (Aamir Khan) and Prem (Salman Khan) are two jobless, foolish, filmy and selfish loafers, on a trip to woo the daughter of a multimillionaire Ram Gopal Bajaj (Paresh Rawal), Raveena Bajaj (Raveena Tandon), who is accompanied by her friend Karishma (Karishma Kapoor) from London to India. Amar and Prem compete with each other and go to all ends doing all sorts of crazy things to get to their goal. Meanwhile, Teja, urff, Shyam Gopal Bajaj is the evil twin of the multimillionaire who wants to get his hands on his brother's wealth by finishing off his daughter. The rest of the movie is about the confusion that follows with a lot more interesting characters. 

Aamir Khan, in his first full fledged comic role, is unbelievably hilarious. Whether it is the wicked Amar or the cute Teelu, he is first class. His dialogue delivery is fabulous and comic timing is perfect. The famous, 'Aap purush hi nahin, Mahapurush hai!!' line from him is totally hilarious, and he makes it work each time he says that even though it is repeated quite a few times. Now, he has grown into an actor par excellence, but this one still remains one of his best performances. After all, comedy is not such an easy thing. Salman Khan, plays the perfect foil to Aamir's bratty character. He is sweet, foolish and goofy and mostly is on the receiving end of Aamir's pranks. I think this was his first comic role too, and now he has mastered the act of playing comic roles. The scenes where Salman speaks in an incredibly funny squeaky voice, similar to that of Donald Duck is awesome. Both of them, together makes the most irresistible comic pair that you can have. They complement each other perfectly and are dot on in their comic timings. While Aamir keeps going 'Ailaa' throughout the movie, Salman goes 'Oeemaa' all the time, something which you cant help laughing out loud at. 


Raveena is beautiful and plays her role well while Karishma is very cute, especially in those scenes where she keeps blinking while talking to Salman. Otherwise, they dont have great roles to play, but they do it well nevertheless. Paresh Rawal as the villain who cries listening to the planning of his accomplices, Teja, is hilarious. The best part is where he says he wants open a poultry farm after getting the 30 crores from his brother. He plays the other role of the strict millionaire Ram Gopal Bajaj, who is very fussy about punctuality, also very well. Shehzad Khan plays the manager Bhalla, and speaks like the yesteryear villain Ajeet. He does that to perfection and everytime he goes, 'Pilan ke mutabik,...', you burst out laughing. Viju Khote plays the butler Robert who keeps on going 'Galti se mistake ho gaya', each time he messes the planning of Bhalla or Teja. Javed Khan plays Anand Akela, who helps out Amar and Prem when they are in trouble. Tiku Talsania and veteran comedians Mehmood and Jagdeep also play their parts effectively. 


But the cherry on the cake is Crime Master Gogo, played to perfection by Shakti Kapoor. He hams it out unbelievably, making Gogo one of the most memorable comic villains ever. He is supposedly the nephew of the great villain Mogambo (from Mr.India). His favourite tagline is 'Aankhen nikaalkar gotiyaan kheloonga!'. Shakti Kapoor shines in the totally over the top climax sequence, where a fight happens at his den. He is certainly my favourite character from the film.




The music of the film is also very memorable. We have the lovely 'Ello ji sanam hum aa gaye' and the funny 'Dil karta hai tere paas aaoon'. The first song, 'Do mastane chale zindagi banane' is a good start as well. But the best one is 'Yeh raat aur yeh doori' with the unforgettable combination of Salman Khan and SP Balasubramaniam. The song has Salman dancing away to glory with Karishma, thinking that she is Raveena, in a beautiful set. Lol. The other songs capture the beauty of Ootty very well too. But more than the music, it is the background score by Viju Shah that works, by elevating each of the comic scenes effectively with the use of background music. Viju Shah doesnt forget to plant digs at Raveena through his own signature tune of the superhit 'Tu cheez badi hai mast mast' when Raveena is introduced in the film. And the other funny sound effects also work perfectly with the over the top narration. You cannot notice the work by the cinematographer and editor and all because you are too involved in the scenes, but they have done decent work nevertheless. The art direction by R Verman is good and almost the whole movie has been shot on sets. 


The movie has a lot of inside jokes about Hindi films. Right from the first scene, where Aamir dreams that he is having an affair with Juhi Chawla. The first dialogue in the movie, 'Aila! Juhi Chawla!' is again unforgettable. Aamir takes digs at Shah Rukh Khan and Sunny Deol in this part and Govinda also puts in an appearance. Later, Salman is shown to be wanting to become a filmstar (something which he always wants in his films, as you can notice, right from this one to Jaanemann) and a lot of names are taken and digs are made at the office of Wah Wah productions, headed by Mehmood. In one of the later scenes where Salman says 'Maine Sholay dus baar dekhi hain', Aamir replies by saying 'Haan haan!! Tere baap ne likha hai na', which is quite literally true. Lol. When Aamir cuts the ribbon of a lock-up, 'Papa kehte hain bada naam karega' is played in the background. Thats what is called smart thinking. And like this, there are a lots and lots of filmy references throughout the film, which is as much spoofing them as much as they are paying tribute to them. (I think this one should have inspired Farah Khan to make the spoof/tribute portions of Main Hoon Na and Om Shanti Om).


The dialogues are fantastic and are remembered till this day. And if this film still works for a fan like me, 15 years after its release and after innumerable re-runs on TV, it should certainly be a classic. Rajkumar Santoshi never made such a movie before and after this, until he made Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani now. And that new movie paid so many tributes to this ultimate comedy by the same director. Even though this movie failed when it released, it did tremendous business in the home video sector and is one of the most watched movies in Indian television history. I sit and watch it fully each time i see it playing on TV myself. And thanks to Moser Baer, i could own the DVD of the film for just 40 bucks. Aamir and Salman said that they want to do a sequel for this movie when they came together in Salman's Dus Ka Dum show. That show which began by Salman and Aamir coming in a cycle singing 'Do mastane chale zindagi banane',  also had a lot of jokes and trivia about this movie. I hope Rajkumar Santoshi makes an apt sequel for this one with those two superstars soon enough. This movie is certainly one of my all time favourites. 

And while concluding, I have something to say about Mr.Santoshi, 'Aap daani hai, gyaani hai, antaryami hai, bahut bade swami hai, shaktimaan hai, buddhimaan hai, balki main to yeh kehta hoon, ke aap purush hi nahin!!'
'Mahapurush hai, mahapurush hai!!' :P