priyadarshan, as always, starts off with his loud, mean and weirdly lovely humour only to reveal the underlying darkness/weight of it all. but what sets this apart is the character of billu who's a sincere, hard working man while in his other films (hera pheri, chup chup ke, khatta meetha, etc) the protagonists are the mean-losers and also the source of comedy.
this sort of becomes a double edged sword as billu's sincerity provides the film with extra heart but also makes his character for the others (along with the audience) to laugh at him for nothing; it just turns the pathetic tone into pity and that almost wrecks the film. but alas irrfan is too good to let that happen here.
dd2b598166