Desi Boyz (2011) – Review in English

About the story: London, 2009. The depression and its consequences also hit Nick Mathur (John Abraham). The worriless investment banker who always earned good money suddenly loses his profitable job – straight after his engagement to Radhika (Deepika Padukone) who already dreams of her wealthy life as Nick's wife. Jerry Patel (Akshay Kumar), Nick's best friend, can't be of any help in this situation; the casual worker is already notoriously broke and lives mostly at the expense of Nick. And now he gets a problem too: After his sister's and brother-in-law's death Jerry had become a surrogate father for his little nephew Veer but now he cannot pay the school fees for him anymore. One night in a bar, a stranger (Sanjay Dutt) emerges as their saviour in need as he turns out to be the boss of the male escort service "Desi Boyz". In their distress Jerry and Nick agree to work secretly as "Rocco" and "Hunter" for Desi Boyz. But the price is high when their cover is blown: Radhika leaves Nick, Veer is taken away from Jerry and put into a foster family, and finally even Nick's and Jerry's friendship goes to pieces...


Sometimes the juniors simply can better. While dad David Dhawan directed the disaster movie of the year 2011 (Rascals), his son Rohit, with the fresh recklessness of a first-time director, showed that comedies can also be made without mindless slapstick and unfunny gags. Hats off to Rohit Dhawan; his directorial debut is a well-made feelgood film with many emotional elements, and even the sequences where Nick and Jerry present themselves and their well-built bodies lack the unpleasant lubricity of certain Rascals scenes and are simply fun, like the rest of the movie.

Besides Rohit Dhawan, credit is to be given above all to the two male leads. Akshay Kumar and John Abraham are a terrific jodi with a wonderful chemistry, and it's a pleasure watching them. Their female co-stars can hardly emerge from their shadows but, on the other hand, they didn't get much to do either, especially Chitrangada Singh as Jerry's flame Tanya who only appears in the film's second half. A little highlight is Omi Vaidya who plays Radhika's luckless wooer, the lawyer Ajay Bapat, as a mixture of sweet simpleton and snappy fox terrier.

The icing on the cake, however, was provided by two veteran actors who visibly enjoyed their parts: Anupam Kher as Radhika's unconventional and maverick father Suresh Awasthi, and Sanjay Dutt as the "Desi Boyz" Boss – always with an amused sparkle in the eye and, especially in the court room scene, cool as ever. Though even here Rohit Dhawan pulled off a feat: He does not present the umpteenth copy of Sanjay's former cool film appearances, here everything has something fresh, unconsumed (even though Sanjay's first scene is accompanied by the indestructible Khalnayak tunes, like shortly before his cameo in Ra.One) – and delightfully funny. Whether Sanjay warbles "Baby don't hurt me no more" or with a downright frivolous twinkle in his eye presents his "Desi Boyz" card to a female judge – with this little guest appearance Sanjay, at the end of an otherwise completely failed film year 2011, finally was successful in presenting a good job again at last! "Special Thanks to Sanjay Dutt" Rohit Dhawan wrote at the beginning of the movie as his thanks to Sanjay who, out of his old friendship with David Dhawan, hadn't hesitated to lend his support also to Rohit (though during the shooting Sanjay went through stressful times as shortly before his twins Iqra and Shahraan had been born prematurely). But Sanjay might just as well have written below it: "Special Thanks to Rohit and the Desi Boyz."

Produced by Krishika Lulla, Vijay Ahuja, Jyoti Deshpande; Directed by Rohit Dhawan
121 Min.; DVD: Eros, English Subtitles (including songs)
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