Sonu Dilli KKC runs guns. But the only thing running more fluently in Jannat 2 is its profanity — and the obligated sensationalism.
Set in a world quite unlike the sprawling Boston-scape of its sister-in-soul, The Departed, the close-sprawled gali’s of Delhi outfitting Jannat 2 gives the movie a perfect excuse to blend and Bollywoodize its thug-turned-informer premise into a plausible “crowd-pleasing” enterprise.
As we can expect from any Mahesh Bhatt production, Jannat 2, in its most brazen sincerity has Emraan Hashmi obliging his unwritten “serial kisser” contract clause in a prolonged song after the middle of the movie. The scene, which drags and sludge’s unrelentingly, muddles its way into the movie almost as a necessary debt. The film worked fine without it.
Apart from his lip-locking commitment, Hashmi turns in a slick, likable, performance as Sonu Dilli KKC (re: Kutti Kameeni Cheez). As his narrative voice tells us in the opening frames, he wears the KKC short-form with as much abandon as his unpegged lifestyle and the film’s unreserved aptitude for profanity.
Sonu, a small-time arms dealer on the way up, is entrapped by Pratap Raghuvanshi (the excellent Randeep Hooda). Pratapis an intemperate ACP,who on off-duty hours,calls up his home-number through a relegated phone-booth to hear his dead wife’s voice on the answering machine. His wife was killed in gunfire, and there’s a bullet in his head which renders him incapable of sleep. Naturally he’s had it in for illegal ammo dealers. Meanwhile, Sonu falls for Jhanvi (Esha Gupta, often looking like a reflection of Lara Dutta) a local doctor, who like any sensible pedestrian, abhors criminality. By now we pretty much see the plot’s heading.
Even on its formulaic setting, the film’s 2 hour-plus runtime is glib with subdued wit and a transparent, straight forward and a disarmingly frank attitude. While Jannat 2 isn’t destined for awards (except H ooda’s captivating, intelligently performed turn – but I may be the only one rooting for him), there is no denying the raw-entertainment factor it presents.
As far as I know Bollywood-cinema, that’s all it takes to make it big. Forget the gun-running. Clichéd Bollywood movie-making is a better business.
