11 July,2026 03:08 PM IST | Mumbai | Mayank Shekhar
A still from ‘Dhamaal 4’. Pic/By Special Arrangement
The only vantage-point to view this over-the-top ensemble comedy from is - as a series of unrelated micro-dramas, or Instagram Reels, for lengthy gags, starring the film's multiple leads, and their cohorts, while the look and feel of the comedy itself, simply, switches genres.
That is, from action-adventure, period piece, family drama, horror comedy, survival thriller - with even more VFX than some sci-fi spectacles - down to a religious exhortation, for emotional effect!
Whatever works for the audience, I guess. The choice is unlimited.
At its core, Indra Kumar's Dhamaal 4, like the three Dhamaals before it, is a children's film. Which includes full set of funny fauna - crocodile, whale, tiger, bats, snake - to fit the wilds of Vantara.
In this mela + melee, even the men and women in the movie could be primates from another jungle. What're they all after? Pots of gold.
This was also the premise reprised from It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) in the film's first part - making this, technically, the fourth adaptation of the same comedy-adventure, starring Spencer Tracy.
Whether each gag is equally a remake of other films - like the background score, Bella Ciao, from the Netflix series, Money Heist - only the Internet is great at discovering, and resharing, over time. I've sub-par memory with drawing quick connections.
For now, just smiling at how Riteish Deshmukh stars in an Andaz Apna Apna (1994) trope. He bribes Gods to get what he wants - like most desis I know.
He tries to land a rich woman, in a huge sedan, who turns out to be the driver's daughter, instead. That she's also overweight weighs him down rather heavily!
Yes, there's enough fat-shaming in this film to put horizontally challenged people off carbs for sometime. That it might put off some people, too, is quite possible.
On such matters, however, I usually err on the side of comedy, over political correctness that is oh, so boring, to begin with. Saying this at the risk of being personally shamed for it too!
That said, Riteish's character is possibly the funniest of the lot, while his heavy-set heroine, Anjali Anand, outperforms several veterans on this show. The franchise's favourite, I suspect, continues to be the under-developed man-child Manav (Jaaved Jaaferi), paired with Adi (Arshad Warsi).
The film with that many stars, and nearly equal screen-time, of course, must first emerge from a spreadsheet than simply a script (by Paritosh Painter and others) - alternating skits between each, with a takia-kalam (recurring refrain) of their own; Bihari "bey" for Riteish, "bro" for Sanjay Mishra, or Jaaved being "not so smart".
How do you even judge such deliberately chaotic lunacy? You start by not judging yourself. As I don't, while cracking up silly - for no reason at all - as Ajay Devgn, the pharaoh of franchise films, and Sanjay, press the bell at a home. Both get instantly electrocuted with their skeletons showing through their jaws. Pleasure's guiltless. The gags are relentless.
A story must take the film forward, howsoever mad. That "Shaitaan Singh ka khazana", from British times, buried in a mountain shaped like M, for money, that everybody is running after, is what in movie-speak is called the MacGuffin. Hitchcock famously described it as "the thing that characters on the screen worry about, but the audience doesn't care!"
You do care, if all these characters will fall off the cliff together, holding on to each other, hanging on the ledge. That's the interval point - as long as any other climax.
The finale is more than a bit of a stretch, in comparison, and it's almost entirely the movie's second half, ending with even an emotional payoff.
As if I'm supposed to take this pic seriously - that starts off with Ravi Kishan as a medieval pirate in a logwood ship, with Ajay landing on it in a jet ski! Do you care?
Well, I don't even remember the three Dhamaals, despite rereading my own reviews, which is essentially words for what I saw - the original, I felt, was likeable; the sequel, stressful to sit through; threequel, just about okay. I guess that's also the nature of the genre - chewing gum of the mind. But you like certain flavours more than others.
Veteran filmmaker Indra Kumar (Dil, Ishq) had another ongoing sex-comedy franchise, Masti, in multiple parts. The last one of which, Mastiii 4 (2025), he gave up directorial duties on. Good for him. That was so bad, it's still stuck somewhere in my brain.
This circus works, all the more, for the likeable leads you wanna get on a brainless joyride with. I'm off. Maybe your turn next.
