Rajdhani Express

There is only question here: “Why would Leander Paes do this?”

After a point Leander Paes' character goes mad. The almost obsolete (almost because it pops up here after a millennium) filmy kind of mad, wherein the character keeps laughing and clapping. Maybe the filmmakers wanted that reaction from its audience, that they would laugh and applaud. The thing is you only have to be stark raving mad to do so.

Rajdhani Express is a film set on a train (duh) which is heading to Mumbai. It is centered on four characters inside one compartment. Till about the interval, there is no plot. Just a bunch of characters going on about something which makes little difference to anybody's life. Unless you are a sleaze-ball. They also strike an apparent “Bollywood connection”. An item girl, a fashion designer and a screenwriter. The screenwriter is a shoddy Bengali stereotype played by Priyanshu Chatterjee. Why any self respecting Indian would do this role is beyond me! I'd rather see a film about four boring characters who don't speak at all, if I have to hear that insipid accent again. There is also the wife of a cabinet minister in one of the compartments. She is supposed to be British. Why? I have absolutely no idea. Maybe it has some symbolism.

Jimmy Shergill plays an ATS officer who probably is the only character concerned about the plot of the film which is basically Leander Paes going rogue and everybody suspects him to be a terrorist. But he is only a man-servant who falls in love with the daughter of his master and is banished from the kingdom. Sorry, there is no kingdom. That sentence just flowed like so since the characters in the film are so unimaginably regressive.

To make matters worse there is a brief song, which is a mash-up of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Raghupati Raja Ram. No, I am not making this up. I had the misfortune of listening to it. But before I could not take it anymore, the train reaches Bombay and the end is near. This is most definitely a train-wreck.

Before I close this review, I ask again. Why would Leander Paes do this? To himself and to us. Every sportsman in India should take note. DON'T ACT IN MOVIES!

Once there was a Rajdhani train

On which clambered a demented brain.

He had had a hard life the poor thing,

But his secrets out he couldn't bring.

In his bag he had a gun

And he decides to have some fun.

But the Minster's parents are travelling too,

And then there is a big to do.

The police commissioner has his own axe to grind

To get a promotion a Bakra he must find.

Who better than our poor wasted brain?

For whom it's all too much and he goes insane.

And the train meanders without a stop

Carrying assorted loonies and demented cops

Before it finally reaches Mumbai

But in getting there uski plot gum ho gayi.

Leander Paes plays the mad guy

And I am compelled to ask him pray tell why?

Isn't your tennis fame enough for you

That you feel compelled to do acting too?

Don't buy a ticket! hop off this train!!

And if its too late, just pull the chain!!!

There are better ways to enjoy I must confess

Than watch a movie like, Rajdhani Express