Meet Sachin (Prateik), a Hindu Maharashtrian boy who is educated, has a degree but is unemployed as he wants to be a film-maker. At first sight, he falls in love with a Christian Keralite landlord’s daughter, Jessie (Amy Jackson). She likes him. He is infatuated and obsessed with her. They become friends.

He blurts out his love for her rather prematurely and she walks off. 

When she goes the next day to her granny in hometown Kerala, Sachin follows her, searches for her and locates her in “the best” church in town where he says she will go for Sunday Mass as she is “the best girl”! He wants to apologize to her, see? She is amused. Her conservative relatives are told that he and his mentor-cum-friend-cum-trip financier, a cameraman played by Manu Rishi, are her classmates. They return by the same train and Jessie submits to a lip kiss.

Wish that this love story, however simple and superficial, had ended here. But 10 more reels are to follow! 

If Sachin represents obsession, Jessie (addressed by him for some weird reason as “Jassi” as in the Punjabi unisexual name!) is the personification of confusion. Till the end, she has no clue of what she wants — from Sachin or otherwise.

The script never explains why Jessie persistently does the exact opposite of what Sachin would expect from her, or we would from a normal girl, in any circumstance. When he wants her to elope, she does not. When he wants her to stay put, she wants to leave home for him! And so on. Her expressions, all one and a half of them seen in the film, are so ambiguous that we cannot fathom what she is thinking. Maybe the script (Menon himself) got to her.

No one bothers to clarify in all the 16 tedium-ridden reels why Jessie’s father yells instead of speaking, or why he does not approve of Sachin. Is it because he considers films as a lowbrow, immoral profession, or is it because they are from different religions, or simply because he is unemployed?

Sachin’s father (a real Sachin — Khedekar, the actor) breathes fire at Jessie’s father when the latter accuses his son of inveigling Jessie. But the parents never interact after that, even though they live in the same building! And why did Sachin spot Jessie only after they were adults in that case? Let it pass!

Jessie’s father (essayed by noted actor B.Antony from Malayalam cinema who was last seen in Hindi films as a menacing villain in the 1988 “Hatya”) himself does not have a clue who Amitabh Bachchan is! That’s supposed to represent how distant he is from the world of films, but to any reasonable human being in this day and age, it only shows that he is a moron who does not read newspapers or watch current affairs and news television!! The man does not even object to his own son going around beating people with a gang of ruffians, and there is some vague reference to another daughter who has married against his wishes to whitewash their attitude!

Sachin’s parents (we are informed) have not watched any film since Ramesh Sippy’s “Sholay”! Poor Sippy is pulled in for a cameo as himself, as Sachin and his cameraman benefactor are showing work for him on his next! Obviously, Sachin’s father has no clue who Kerala’s superstar Mohanlal is either, showing that his general knowledge is as woefully inadequate as Jessie’s dad’s. In the second half, the film disposes of Sachin’s family completely – and for good! They are never there during Sachin’s (faker than paper flowers) crisis, and not even there for the happy ending, when the newlyweds go to seek Jessie’s parents blessings (secularism, see? Because they are not minority and one scene shows that Sachin’s father has no objection to his son’s choice!).

Manu Rishi doubles up as dialogues writer, and so many times we, the audience, double up in laughter at his lines – but for the wrong reasons. Can’t blame the man, for the script is so loony he was compelled to write such ridiculous lines! The worst part of the film are the last 30 minutes of this convoluted, over-lengthy enterprise, comprising an absurd and overlong pre-climax where Jessie dumps him and goes to the U.K. (!) and another girl keeps angling for him and the post-climax where they meet again, finally (yawnnnnnn!) decide to marry and the script spends 10 more rambling minutes more on inessentials! At this time, with Jessie’s ambiguous facial expressions, you expect her to do a volte-face again!!

One fails to understand what was there in this film and songs that made the Tamil original such a major hit down south! Rahman recycles some of those tunes and adds some original disasters too – the much-hyped “Hosanna” does not even have a lingering hook! The composer seems to think that screaming in high octaves equals music and songs. The first few songs are the normal gymnastic ones with extras till the music “settles” down to manic vocal intrusions in the otherwise well-done background score.

The big surprise in this film is Prateik – the man actually puts in a really impressive performance, even more so, given the completely wonky role and fuddled script. Perfectly cast (we believe ARR recommended him!), he enlivens and makes believable even the silliest sequences, romantic or otherwise. Welcome a late arrival – a good actor called Prateik. This is his first performance ever in the real sense.

The rest of the film is plain, unadulterated nonsense, never mind the bewitching camerawork, which is packaging, not content.

Rating: *

Photon Kathaas, R.S.Infotainment and Fox Star Studios present

Ek Deewana Tha: Mad (‘Deewana’) in a Different Sense!

Directed by: Gautham Vasudev Menon

Music: A.R.Rahman

Starring: Prateik, Amy Jackson, Manu Rishi, B.Antony, Sachin Khedekar, Ramesh Sippy & others