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Prem agony

Syed Firdaus Ashraf

A still from Prem Aggan. Click for bigger pic!

What do you expect when a relatively poor man's son falls in love with a rich man's daughter in a Bollywood film. Clashes, complex dialogues on the iniquity of society and traditions, and a variety of people hinting at the close resemblance between the lovers and the Laila Majnu pair... You get a general idea what Prem Aggan is all about now?

Sooraj (Fardeen Khan) is a son of a colonel in the army, Veer Bahadur Singh (Raj Babbar). He falls for Sapna (Meghana Kothari), the daughter of a software tycoon, JK, (Anupam Kher). And you note that finally the software business is having an impact on Hindi cinema too.

Tycoon is big deal in every sense. He is almost all the time in a private helicopter and if he picks his mobile phone, he isn't telling the wife he's not coming for lunch, but telling cabinet ministers where they get off. Apparently, even 'Bill Gates' would feel ashamed to see this man's style of functioning. Or so we are informed. Big trouble is, the manager to beat Gates doesn't like his daughter snuggling up to a poor colonel's son.

So JK uses all his managerial skills to keep his daughter away from lover boy. And to aid JK's cause is his diligent son, who roams around with dogs to keep Romeo away from his sister. The chap ends up looking obnoxious, and not just because the role demands it of him.

A still from Prem Aggan. Click for bigger pic!

Of course, director, producer and scriptwriter Feroz Khan, being away from college a long time, forgot that young people do go to college more often than shown, and that that is where opportunity for a clandestine rendezvous or two could be exploited for the film. It isn't though.

An interesting factor is that every character in the film is well versed with the love stories of yore, as if grandma, perhaps harking back to her youth, ladled out only the mushy stuff as she dandled them on her knee.

The colonel has no problem about his son marrying a rich man's daughter. His wife (Smita Jaykar), meanwhile, warms a wheelchair and laments that she has become a burden on the colonel's life. She might not have been a problem if she had gone easier on the self-recrimination.

She doesn't but the colonel's a brave and resourceful man. He tells her he's happy that she has gifted him the most precious thing in his life, his son.

A still from Prem Aggan. Click for bigger pic!

In line with this line of thought, when the boy tires of his bicycle, the doting father gives him an imported Suzuki bike. All of 1000 ccs. And the son is as caring, heading for home and trying to return the expensive toy.But the colonel bridles and tells him Indian Army colonels aren't so lowly paid -- even though they may not be able to compete with software tycoons.

Anyway, to get on, the tycoon catches the lovers in bed one day. They note his presence only after a session of heavy duty smooching. Irritated papa tells his henchman to liquidate the Romeo and drags his daughter away.

The daughter wails in distress and says if Romeo kicks the bucket then so will she. So dad satisfies himself telling her he will spare the colonel's pup if she marries young business partner (Rajesh, a newcomer.)

She acquiesces but vows she will never speak to her father again too. So, a badly beaten Sooraj is left alone by the goons when JK, for a change, makes a call to them.

A still from Prem Aggan. Click for bigger pic!

The software tycoon decides to play safe and leave India forever, settling in Australia, where the business partner lives. Sapna can't get over Sooraj and drowns her sorrow in drink.

Sooraj, being in India, doesn't hit the bottle, singing doleful songs of love and parting. The colonel suggests he quit this moaning, sell the darned bike, and take the next flight to Australia. And, just to drive the point, he harks back to grandma's tale, telling his son that had Mumtaz been alive, Emperor Shahjahan would have sold the Taj for her.

Strangely, Romeo has this friend in Australia who isn't so important that he be named in the movie. This chap apparently runs a service that keeps a tab on tycoon families.

And thus does Sooraj locate the JK residence and comes in for the engagement ceremony of the daughter. JK is shocked, but Sooraj is even more upset, deciding his gal has opted for lucre over love. Till, she secretly gets the message across that she'll meet him someplace quiet.

And the fiancee, who just happens to be an eavesdropper, gets nasty, and says hang the business and his reputation and gets a bunch of bad Australian guys over with the intention of thrashing the Romeo and raping Juliet. That's how it goes...

A still from Prem Aggan. Click for bigger pic!

Fardeen Khan's acting is above average, but needs some improvement to be called respectably. But not bad for a newcomer . You wonder though, if he'd lost his razor someplace, for he isn't clean shaven anywhere in the film.

Meghana Kothari is pathetic. And her diction is ghastly. Raj Babbar's role is unbearable, particularly all those rambling monologues on 'love'. Anupam Kher, despite being a software giant, is never seen before a machine. And, he's just wasted anyway.

Satish Shah and Rakesh Bedi, despite their small roles, stole the show. The director could have done better to stress on comedy here.

There were a lot of expectations from this film, since Feroz Khan was betting his son's career on it. But the script and the music are ordinary; only the the title song, Prem Aggan, is passable.

Face it, guys and gals, Prem Aggan just isn't worth the trouble.

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