Director Nikhil Advani piles on the overkill, which, again, is par for the course in Bollywood, whose films give you everything and then some, whose films would never settle for drama when melodrama will do, but here, the overkill is just plain tiring. "Chandni Chowk to China" runs two and a half hours, which is short by Indian cinema standards but far, far, far too long for a story so lightweight. The pace shouldn't matter - if you're familiar with Bollywood, you'll know that "hurry" is not in the vocabulary- but oh, how it does. Then there's the lunatic, amnesia-stricken beggar (Roger Yuan) whose past might tie everything together, although the movie's in no hurry to get there. We're also tossed a mess about Sidhu's infatuation with a home shopping hostess (Deepika Padukone) who in turn is repeatedly mistaken for look-alike Meow Meow (Padukone again), a deadly assassin hired by Hojo to kill Sidhu. It's all very "Kung Fu Panda" meets "Three Amigos" meets every chop socky flick ever made, and that's only a fraction of the overall story. After he's humiliated and beaten, Sidhu gets trained in kung fu to earn his true calling. But Sidhu's con artist pal Chopstick (Ranvir Shorey), acting as translator, conveniently left out the "do battle" part, tempting Sidhu with tales of riches instead. Things perk up for Sidhu when he's told he's the reincarnation of the ancient Chinese warrior Liu Sheng he's whisked away to a small Chinese village, where the locals hope he can do battle with the villainous Hojo (kung fu cinema legend Gordon Liu, the film's lone bright spot). Kumar stars as Sidhu, a dopey peasant from the Chandni Chowk district of Delhi who chops vegetables at his father's restaurant, and who is beset with such enormous bad luck that he sets his winning lottery ticket ablaze. This is a loud, relentless film, full of flailing and shouting and desperate mugging its star, Akshay Kumar, seems out to annoy the world, one viewer at a time. A key inspiration here is obviously "Kung Fu Hustle," which is copied with great energy but no understanding of action, or comedy, or quality. "Chandni Chowk to China" tries to juggle Bollywood musical with martial arts action and slapstick comedy and fails at all three.
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