Khel Khel Mein Movie Review: Humour & Home Truths

Khel Khel Mein Movie Cast/ Actors: Akshay Kumar as Rishabh Malik, Ammy Virk as Harpreet, Taapsee Pannu as Harpreet, Vaani Kapoor as Vartika Malik, Fardeen Khan as Kabir, Pragya Jaiswal as Naina, Aditya Seal as Samar & others.

Khel Khel Mein Movie Director: Mudassar Aziz

Khel Khel Mein Movie Release Date: August 15, 2024

Khel Khel Mein Movie Available On: Theatrical Release and (likely to be released on Netflix OTT Platform)

Khel Khel Mein Movie Movie Released/ Available In Languages: Hindi

Khel Khel Mein Movie Runtime: 135 Minutes

Khel Khel Mein Movie Critic Review:

The story idea comes from the 2016 Italian film Perfectti Sconosciuti (Perfect Strangers) but the flavour is completely contemporary desi.

Plastic surgeon Rishabh Malik (Akshay Kumar, greying agreeably) fibs his way through life but is truthful about it. “Yeah, I fib, so?” Who doesn’t, will soon follow when author-wife Vartika (Vaani Kapoor) and five other friends get together at a Jaipur wedding and play an unscripted new game all by themselves in Rishabh’s suite. They put their mobile phones on the table, the rules allowing everyone in the suite to read/hear messages and calls for the rest of the evening.

The men are appalled. Can’t we play dumb charades or something else?

But Vartika’s suggestion has hands going up in support, unaware that each of them will soon have a secret tumbling out.

Writer-director Mudassar Aziz peppers the rocky equations in their marriages with a lightness that promises comforting entertainment and not heavy marital tensions. Harpreet Male (Ammy Virk) and Harpreet Female (Taapsee Pannu), undergoing treatment for fertility/sperm count issues, has the husband grumbling, “Sex has become like a workout regimen, only the trainer is missing.” An elder at the Jaipur wedding remarks that youngsters treat marriage like an iPhone. “Try it out for two years.” But it isn’t funny for Samar (Aditya Seal) when he works for his prickly father-in-law and has an airhead for a wife. Spendthrift Naina (Pragya Jaiswal) asks questions like, “What does ghulami mean?”

Add to this six-some, singleton Kabir (Fardeen Khan), a cricket coach who’s just lost his job. “Tu chick magnet hai,” says Harpreet (Male) to him while switching phones with him and creating more confusion.

Mudassar keeps his narration the way a dramedy should be – humorous with dramatic home truths that spill out after every message and call.

Akshay Kumar, playing a middle-aged man with a difficult teenage daughter from his first marriage who won’t accept Vartika, is an easy fit in such an ensemble cast. Taapsee Pannu is also a pleasant departure from those women-centric films that don’t work and sparkles as Harpreet (Female).

For what’s missing: 1) Some foot-tapping music would’ve helped elevate the entertainment. Can’t get away with a chirpy ‘Parde mein rehne do’ in the background every time a secret’s about to tumble out. 2) The enforced gay angle is getting to be predictably tiresome. And 3) what on earth has Chitrangada Singh (as Kadambari, Rishabh’s attractive co-passenger on a flight who he later dismisses to his wife as a boring, elderly lady) done to her lips?

Khel Khel Mein Movie – Watch Or Not?: Although all eyes are on Stree 2 and Akshay Kumar is not currently a box-office darling, this is an enjoyable, tension-free watch.

Khel Khel Mein Movie Review Score Rating: 3 out of 5 (i.e. 3/5)

Khel Khel Mein Movie Official Trailer: