We are Family Review - Disgustingly Bad

We are Family: Ohhh, We are a Box Office Disaster

There are bad Bollywood movies.

Then there are very bad Bollywood movies.

Finally, there are the disgustingly, terribly bad Bollywood movies like We are Family (Kajol, Kareena Kapoor and Arjun Rampal) that are unworthy of even being screened in theaters.

Surely, a special place is reserved in hell for the Shaitans (makers and cast) involved with the Karan Johar produced We Are Family.

Not so much a movie as cow-dung flung on the screen, We Are Family suffers from intolerably hideous acting, incomprehensibly awful screenplay and insanely bad music.

That we managed to come out of the movie-hall with our sanity intact after sitting through this nightmare is nothing short of a miracle.

Pitiful Remake of Stepmom
As all but the schmucks know by now, We are Family is a remake of the 1998 Hollywood film Stepmom (featuring the peerless Susan Sarandon and Pretty Woman Julia Roberts).

Stepmom is hardly a masterpiece and yet it’s a million times more watchable than We are Family.

With some minor variations, We are Family hews to the Stepmom story line of a divorced man (Arjun Rampal) with a bunch of kids finding a new girlfriend (Kareena Kapoor) and the none-too-happy reaction of the kids and their divorced mom (Kajol). There are two kids in Stepmom but this being a movie from the overpopulated land India, there are three in We are Family. Also, while stepmom-to-be Julia Roberts’s character Isabel plays the photographer in Stepmom, it’s Arjun Rampal’s character Aman, who’s the photographer in the Bollywood version.

But the big difference is the terribly sloppy, crude screenplay in We are Family which robs viewers of any possible joy from the movie.

In not one of the confrontations between Kajol’s character Maya and Shreya (Kareena), be it the early one after Anjali’s birthday-party or the later ones at the police station or the peanut butter incident towards the end, were there any display of emotional fireworks. Zilch, nada. nichts. 🙁

Horrible Acting
Sensible people don’t expect any kind of acting from that freak-show Kareena Kapoor with the perennial retarded expression pasted on her face but Kajol can still surprise you occasionally.

Alas, Kajol renders a totally lifeless performance in We are Family. Was the mom-to-be Kajol suffering from morning sickness throughout the making of the movie cos for much of the film she sports a lifeless, enervated look of a woman just back from the bathroom after puking her guts out.

Besides failing to deliver the acting goods in the many confrontation with Shreya, Kajol’s character Maya is also hopelessly bad vis-a-vis the doctor’s verdict, in all her interactions with ex-husband Aman (Arjun Rampal) and with the kids.

Tragically, there’s almost zero chemistry between Kajol and the three kids unlike the extraordinary chemistry Susan Sarandon’s character Jackie shares with the two kids Ben and Anna in Stepmom.

As for Arjun Rampal, let’s all just agree that one cage at the local circus or zoo is missing one occupant.

Liam Aikey, who plays the young boy Ben in Stepmom, was adorable and a treat to watch.

Au contraire, the three kids Shanis (devils) in We are Family – Aanchal Munjal (Aleya), Nominath Ginsburg (Ankush) and Diya Sonecha (Anjali) are a torment, so hopelessly bad that we wouldn’t be surprised if they did not make it into their school drama teams.

Truth be said, Liam Aikey did better than all of the actors in We are Family combined.

But then the biggest Shani of ’em all is director Siddharth Malhotra for ultimately it’s his responsibility to extract good acting from his team. This buffoon wateva Malhotra is not fit to direct a kindergarten drama and to entrust this thing with full responsibility for a feature film is sheer insanity.

If you think music will salvage this piece of crap, boy, you sure are in ra-ra land. Mediocre like the rest of this trash. Susan Sarandon and young Liam Aikey lip-syncing to the Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell’s hit song Ain’t No Mountain High Enough in Stepmom was a delight to behold. Sorry, we puked when Kajol, Kareena, Arjun and their brood did the Elvis number Jail House Rock in We are Family.

Piece of Shit
Guys/Gals, if you take a soldering iron to your balls or boobs you’re likely to inflict less pain on yourself compared to watching this piece of shit called We are Family.

To all our readers, we strongly recommend that you raise your middle finger to We are Family and rent Stepmom from Netflix or your neighborhood Blockbuster.

We are Family is most definitely not worth your time or money.

If you’re craving some nice entertainment this Labor Day weekend, go watch Get Low, The American or Animal Kingdom running in theaters across the U.S.

Arjun Rampal, Kajol, Karan Johar, Kareena, Kareena Kapoor, We Are Family