Uunchai movie review: Hum saath-saath hain now too with sugary sweetness, group dances and zero subtlety

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Anupam Kher, Boman Irani, Danny Denzongpa, Sarika, Neena Gupta, Parineeti Chopra, Nafisa Ali Director: Sooraj Barjatya Language: Hindi Four friends gather to celebrate the birthday of one. Amit Shrivastav ( Amitabh Bachchan) is a bestselling author who prides himself on his success with young readers. He has a wife but, as one fan points out, she has never been seen in public. Om Sharma ( Anupam Kher) runs a shop with his son and is openly resistant to change. Javed (Boman Irani) loves his spouse Shabina ( Neena Gupta) who in turn dotes on him but keeps him on a tight leash. And then there is Bhupen ( Danny Denzongpa), whose sudden death serves as a spark that sends the others on a trek to the Himalayas. [caption id=“attachment_11613131” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Uunchai[/caption] The men are all senior citizens, so the journey becomes a medium for a life-affirming lesson about how you are never too old to scale great heights. Uunchai (Height) is helmed by Sooraj Barjatya who, in the 30-plus years since his blockbuster debut with Maine Pyar Kiya, has not once deviated from his signature conservatism or predictability in storytelling. It is fair then to assume from what is revealed or pointedly hinted at in early scenes that at least a couple of secrets will be confessed by the finale, new equations will be formed, the buddies will each smooth out the wrinkles and fill out the cracks in their respective family relationships, and if there is evolution, then it will be written with extreme care to ensure that the social status quo is not rocked to such an extent as to make a traditionalist audience uncomfortable. It is also fair to assume that the path to self-discovery will be lined with sugary sweetness, sanskaar and group dances with choreography familiar from all the director’s earlier films. Both assumptions are proved right. The film’s message about living life to the fullest at every age is, of course, heartening, and of significance in India where the scripturally inspired social expectation is that every person will naturally settle into Sanyas once they have conformed to the other prescribed stages of human existence: Brahmacharya, Grihastha and Vanaprastha. But the means to that message is so maudlin, and the risks taken by the Big B’s character Amit so ridiculous, that an important point is lost. Emotions run high throughout Uunchai. Every feeling every character experiences is signalled and then repeatedly underlined with a marked change in the loud background score. The humour is childish, particularly so in passages involving Om sniping at Bhupen and later Javed. And the narrative style is terribly outdated. Stereotypes abound, most markedly in the writing of the women. One wife automatically gets jealous at the mere mention of the possibility that a woman will be travelling with her husband. Several long – oh so long! – stretches are devoted to jokes about her suspicious nature and how no man should ever praise another woman in the presence of his own partner. A second woman ditches her boyfriend, not under pressure from her family as is initially indicated, but because she is overwhelmed by the wealth of an alternative prospective groom. As we often see happening in the real world, a wife’s meticulous planning of her husband’s healthcare is portrayed as suffocating behaviour. These women are not villainised, which suggests that these clichés are emerging from genuine conviction – I’m not sure if that’s better or worse than insidious intent. Meanwhile, of course there are un-sanskaari children in the picture who are unmindful of their lovely parents’ devotion and wishes. Quite unexpectedly, in the latter case, at least one father is shown introspecting and adapting to the new generation’s dreams. I suppose it is a revolutionary step for The House of Barjatya to concede that parents may possibly be wrong. As the sort of person who likes to see the glass as half full, I am tempted to celebrate, but Uunchai is so lacking in nuance that everything about it feels contrived and staged. Even this. The only positive that seems to flow naturally is the completely normalised portrayal of the Muslim family among the friends. Sadly, what flows just as naturally is the story’s emphatically upper-caste universe, evident not only through the characters’ surnames but also the casual mention of Brahminical practices, as is the norm with Hindi cinema. As the gang goes from Delhi to Kanpur, Lucknow, Agra and Nepal, we are served some stunning frames of the mountains, but their impact is diluted by the in-your-face studio shots. Worse, the narrative becomes increasingly mushy with every passing minute until it gets tiring. [caption id=“attachment_11613141” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Uunchai[/caption] Amitabh Bachchan and Boman Irani hold back to a certain extent even when the melodrama gets overwhelming. Sarika and Neena Gupta are as restrained as is possible in such a film. Anupam Kher, who is capable of so much better, over-acts inexorably here, especially in his comical interludes, but is overshadowed by Nafisa Ali who looks luminous but under-acts in what is possibly the film’s worst scene. Parineeti Chopra as a mountaineer and guide is wasted in a marginal role. And Danny Denzongpa’s cameo is a reminder of his warm screen presence that is much missed in Hindi cinema. Uunchai is a call to the elderly to embrace life and accept change. Ironically, the film itself is stuck in time. Rating: 1 (out of 5 stars) 

This review was first published when Uunchai was released in theatres in November 2022. The film is now streaming on Zee5. 

Anna M.M. Vetticad is an award-winning journalist and author of The Adventures of an Intrepid Film Critic. She specialises in the intersection of cinema with feminist and other socio-political concerns. Twitter: @annavetticad, Instagram: @annammvetticad, Facebook: AnnaMMVetticadOfficial Read all the ** Latest News****,** ** Trending News****,** ** Cricket News****,** ** Bollywood News****,**  India News and  Entertainment News here. Follow us on ** Facebook****,**  Twitter and ** Instagram****.**