EK RISHTAA
(Starring Amitabh Bachchan, Akshay Kumar, Karisma Kapoor, Juhi Chawla)

RATING:
*****
Suneel Darshan's attempt at animal instinct seems to be much better than his latest venture on relationships.

The story is about Mr Trusting who meets Mr Baddie and mistaking him for Mr Good Man, gives him his business and his daughter's hand as well.

Mr Baddie comes out with his true colours one fine morning. Too bad, trusting's family disintegrates.

Then comes the climax and the obviously good triumphs over evil and happy ending.

In other words, Vijay Kapoor is Amitabh Bachchan a rich industrialist, who knows everything about everything, employs Rajesh that is Mohnish Bahl to work in his office and then sends him to his house to help solve daughter Preeti's aka Juhi Chawla crossword!!! , where the two fall in love and marry.

Enter Vijay's son Ajay aka Akshay Kumar and Nisha aka Karisma Kapoor in designer outfits dancing on the Twin Towers in Kuala Lampur and after a few unsuccessful attempts to woo her away from 'some actor Sunil' (Sunil Shetty) he finally gets her.

Ajay joins his father's mill as a worker where he sees union leader - Hari Singh's (Ashish Vidyarthi's) malpractices and bashes him up.

Result - he has to apologise to him 'because it was he who made the mistake.'

The generation gap between the father and son widens on this issue and Ajay walks out of the house. Nisha also elopes with him and the two get married.

In the meanwhile Rajesh has managed to con Vijay Kapoor and get all his property mortgaged.

And Vijay has realised this a little too late.

What happens next?

Will Vijay Kapoor industries ever come out of its debt? Even if the father and son do join hands, will the ever be able to save their house?

It's best if seen...

Sadly, there seems to be no real rishtaa of director Suneel Darshan with the story.

Towards the end, you hardy know where the movie is heading.

There is hardly any continuity, which is further broken, thanks to the dream songs.

Talking about songs, the music of the film is not good. 'Bad' would not be the right word for it, and it definitely does not measure up to the Nadeem Shravan standards.

Also at some points, there is a tinge of the Dhadkan tunes.

One wonders why Darshan went all the way to London to sign Nadeem Shravan for the film.

The songs are also badly placed.

And at one point, you tend to feel that it is a music album around which the director has tried to make a movie!!!

Bachchan is excellent.

He adds grace to a role, which could have in normal circumstances been essayed by an Alok Nath or Anupam Kher.

Some of his dialogues, especially the one in the climax, are very good.

Otherwise most of his confrontation scenes with Akshay are very illogical.

After all that hype about Amitabh and Rakhee coming together after more than a decade, it is really a pity to see an actress of Rakhee's calibre being wasted on a role which could have been given to any Anjana Mumtaz.

Her presence is not worth it at all.

As is the case of pregnant Juhi Chawla, who has made a rather stupid decision of settling for a lower billing in the credit lines than Karisma.

Her pregnancy is very visible throughout the movie. At least after getting married in the film, she could have been shown pregnant!!

Akshay Kumar's performance is passable.

But is not as good as he ought to be.

Nevertheless, there are certain emotional scenes where he does a commendable job.

Shakti Kapoor is also wasted as Rakhee's brother as is Kunika.

Karisma should definitely look for more meatier roles.

Mohnish Bahl is atrocious.

Simone 'Heena' Singh who is Akshay's lovable sister has done a pretty good job.

The wedding scene where she meets the ousted Akshay is very touching.

Ashish Vidyarthi puts up a good performance but when you think you've had enough of him, he is still there, and there and there (yawn!).

Suneel Darshan needs a lesson in dealing with stories that are about bonding.

He is not capable when it comes to handling an emotional film based on a family subject.

And that brings us to the subject of editing glitches, continuity glitches and worse, rishtaa glitches mar the film as well.

There are so many Rishtaa glitches like Karisma leaving Akshay when she is pregnant and Juhi putting up with Bahl though he has broken up her family... all this sounds quite silly.

But well, for those who are Bachchan fans... you better not miss the film.

The man is too good, though the film may not be a good follow up for him after Mohabbatein.

All in all, it is a film like any other that comes and goes... nothing too great to rave about.

But if the film does manage to make a good run, which we doubt, it will only be because of Bachchan and his Ek Rishtaa - the bond of love with the audiences for decades!

RELEASE DATE: 18th May 2001