Movie Review: Welcome to New York
2.5/5
The film centers around a popular award show held abroad. Diljit Dosanjh, a good hearted goonda with a fetish for Bollywood and Sonakshi Sinha, a dress designer who wants to be the next Manish Malhotra, win a contest which ensures their entry to the said award show. But there is more to their sudden good fortune than what meets the eye. What follows is a series of misadventures where the who's who of Bollywood make cameo appearances. It's all good clean fun inspired by Leslie Nielsen comedies where broad comedy ruled, no one took themselves seriously and the audience too wasn't expected to treat it as something sublime. Everything was fare game as long as it elicited some laughs and that's the general idea here as well.It's rare for the film industry to make a film that take digs at itself. Rarer still to see one of the biggest names in the industry, Karan Johar, taking good natured potshots at himself and his brand of cinema. Karan actually plays a double role, that of his evil twin Arjun - yes there is a Karan Arjun joke here, full marks for making the connection. Arjun is a womaniser, which is one of the many inside jokes of the film. Rana Daggubati plays himself. He's sort of still in the Baahubali mode which leads to -- you guessed it, Baahubali jokes. But the most delicious irony served by the film is when Aditya Roy Kapur, playing himself, offers acting advice.
As stated earlier, the film is based on an awards show nite. So expect numerous plug-ins for the said award. And jump cuts of the audience enjoying the show. Because of the constraints of time and space, the romance between Diljit and Sonakshi doesn't get developed properly. They do share a certain chemistry and deserve another film atleast to showcase it properly. Karan and Riteish Deshmukh, as the sparring hosts, have a great camraderie going as well. We wish there were more of their scenes together and that they took shots at other stars as well and not just at one another.
All-in-all, Welcome To New York is more a series of comedy skits stuck loosely together than an actual film with a coherent plot and screenplay. It's a fresh idea alright and better execution would have turned it into an eminently enjoyable film. That said, we reiterate that it's seldom that the film industry agrees to laugh at itself and the film should be appreciated for that fact alone. And let's add that Sonakshi took much flak for her red carpet appearance at the particular awards show abroad sometime ago. Well, now we know it was all part of her role in the film and hence brave of her to do so.
