Bad Newz review: Aspiring to be Rocky aur Rani Kii Prem Kahani, it is a casual watch that hardly entertains

Directed by Anand Tiwari, Bad Newz tries too hard to be the next Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani but ends up being a mishmash of Bollywood clichés.

Bad Newz review: With the current pop culture scenario, the minute someone mentions Bad Newz, you instantly think of the Tauba Tauba trend which is an internet rage right now. Often enough, songs have been a major factor to lure the audience into the theaters and that's what seems to have happened with Bad Newz. But when you watch it, you realize that the two minute song by Karan Aujla is more exciting than the entire film.

The film starts with Saloni (Triptii Dimri) having a meet-cute with Akhil (Vicky Kaushal) at a wedding. It instantly reminds you of Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani because the minute Vicky’s character is introduced, you see him acting like he is Rocky’s long lost brother. It’s the same lingo, the same swag and comic timing. And then there’s Saloni who is a career-oriented woman. She wants to be the next ‘Meraki’ star chef which is a fictional equivalent for Michelin star. Even though the two had different outlooks on life, love truly blinds them and they eventually end up getting married. But since day one of their marriage, Saloni realizes that Akhil is rather different from the man she thought she married. He is a mumma’s boy through and through who cannot go an hour without talking to her. If that wasn’t enough, he adds to the list of his annoying shenanigans by showing up at Saloni’s workplace every single day with surprises and gifts. This leads to them getting a divorce and Saloni moving to Mussoorie, where she falls for her boss, Gurbir (Ammy Virk). 

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After a night of mishaps, she ends up sleeping with Gurbhir, and on the same night, she sleeps with her ex-husband, Akhil, who happened to be there to surprise her. This lands the three of them in a once in an eon phenomenon called heteropaternal superfecundation - a reproductive process where twins are born to one mother from two different biological fathers. As bizarre as this sounds, this is actually the smallest issue that the film has. Bad Newz fully banks on Bollywood nostalgia and constantly makes reference to popular films that are supposed to be funny. There are dialogues like ‘hum Ladka Haye Allah se Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi ban gaye’, there are song snippets taken from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, Mohabbatein, Dil Toh Pagal Hai and Duplicate. Akhil is referred to as ‘Mannmarziyan ka Vicky Kaushal’ and he gets mad when someone talks about Katrina Kaif. There is also a FRIENDS reference in the film where Saloni mentions, "FRIENDS ki Rachel ne kaha hai, no uterus no opinion’. Saloni’s parents ask her to be thankful to Akhil because he loves her and hits people who trouble her because there are people like their neighbor, ‘Kabir’, who loves and hits his wife, 'Preeti'. There’s way too many pop culture references and while there’s nothing wrong with that per say, the film refuses to become anything more than that.

Rocky Randhawa unlearnt and learnt things for the love of his life but his stan fan Akhil does not follow his footsteps at all. Some of his thoughts in the film are rather regressive. He believes a woman with a tattoo cannot be a good wife and nowhere during the course of the movie does he apologize to her for saying that. Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani questioned a lot of the things we have grown up on thinking as normal but Bad Newz is just plain narrow minded in a lot of ways. Even the way Saloni gets Gurbir to sleep with her is rather problematic. Constantly shouting and asking someone for consent does not make it okay. After Gurbir repeatedly tells her that he wants to take it slow, she does not respect his word one bit and he feels compelled to spend the night with her. Then there’s her pregnancy, which becomes fully about the men competing to gain her attention and make decisions on her behalf. 

Between the lead cast, Vicky Kaushal has the best comic timing out of the three, and if not that, his stunning body distracts you from the other two. We’ve previously seen Triptii Dimri in Qala and Animal bith with way darker themes than this one. While it was refreshing to see her in a comedy for once, she does need to work on her comic timing and 'the girl next door' vibe for light hearted films like this. The real third wheel of the film isn’t Ammy Virk though, it's the unfathomable background score of the film. This is a pattern that Dharma has followed in the past as well where even the most trivial of characters get their own background music. For instance - there is a scene where Akhil and Saloni follow Gurbir somewhere and the BGM literally says ‘come follow me’. The guy who plays Akhil's uncle in the film gets a BGM that just constantly says ‘mama’. It's as if we, as an audience, can’t figure stuff out on our own. It fully takes away from the comedy the film is trying to create.

After a streak of violent films on-screen, we sure do need a breather but unfortunately, Bad Newz doesn't cut it. 

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