Kismat Konnection, a Red Chilies venture  directed by Aziz Mirza, which opened this Friday, is  a big disappointment.  

I wanted to like it, I really did.   I’ve enjoyed Vidya Balan since her debut in Parineeta, and, now that Shahid Kapoor has gotten a little older, I no longer feel guilty for even contemplating ogling him  (he looked so young before, I felt as though the  federal government would burst in, seize my laptop and  put me on some sort of list for improper thoughts towards a minor), so I had every expectation that this might be a fun film.

Sadly, it’s not.   The most exciting moment comes early on as we see a late-for-a-meeting Raj Malhotra (Shahid) shirtless and soapy in the shower just as the water cuts off.   It was all pretty blah after that.   The vanishing water  is the start of another day of bad luck for Raj, something that is tormenting him since having been voted most likely to succeed in university.   He’s a struggling architect trying to get that first big job in Toronto, where the film is shot.

He meets Aditi  Priya  (Vidya) in several unpleasant encounters, before he realizes, with the help of a TV clairvoyant (Juhi Chawla as a trippy, dippy seer) that  Priya is his good luck charm and he must do all he can to keep her close.   Yes, of course, they fall in love and there are obstacles (mall development versus the demolition of a community center, Priya’s engaged to someone else), etc etc.   But being predictable or having a formulaic story here is not the problem.  

Rather, the film is airless and stale.   There’s zero spark or chemistry between Vidya and Shahid, though they look cute individually, she looks much more mature than her co-star, and he still has that toothy boyish charm, though, as we see in the shower scene, he’s also been working out a lot, but  they’re just not terribly believable as a couple.

The music, well, really just the first and last songs, are ok, but the picturizations are awful.   The costumes look like they were made from fabrics bought at a 99-cent store and unlike, say, the Mast Kalander sequence from Heyy Babyy, there’s too many badly coordinated colors all running amok as the dancers go through their ho-hum paces, and the lighting is odd in those scenes too.   Note also that Shahid (an accomplished dancer) does all the hoofing, while Vidya’s work consists mainly of posing for the camera.

Om Puri plays Mr. Gill, the head of a big firm Raj wants to work with, but this is obviously one of those roles OP takes so that he can afford to do smaller, arty roles in less mainstream films, like his part in Maqbool.

See it or skip it?

Skip it, unless you’re a really big fan of either of the two co-stars.