Bengaluru : Jaggu Dada, the third generation in a family of goons, is stuck in a sticky situation when his dead grandfather haunts him to get married a ‘cultured girl’. No one in his town wants to marry their daughter off to a don, leading him to go to Mumbai to con someone to do the same. A lot of mayhem follows there…

First-time filmmaker Raghavendra Hegde’s Jaggu Dada is intrinsically a masala action comedy, which is tailored to ensure the superstar hero lives up to the ‘image’ that he has built for his fans. As the film progresses, one is reminded of many films, some of these include Kuch Naa Kaho, Bride And Prejudice, Chamatkar, Welcome and Munnabhai series. Sadly, this mishmash hasn’t resulted in well-knit end product. The film did have the potential of being a winner, especially with the initial part of a dead grandfather haunting for his last wish to be fulfilled. P Ravi Shankar in the comical role reminds one of the dead Naseeruddin Shah of Chamatkar at times. The film then progresses into a part-hilarious juncture, which has Jaggu Dada, now disguised as a suave Dubai-businessman Jaidev, in search of a girl. A pretty marriage broker, a la Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in Kuch Naa Kaho, is there to helm him. But, Jaidev doesn’t like any girl she shows and, as fate would have it, he falls for the matchmaker Gowri. Had these situations been handled deftly, the film could have possibly worked better. Unfortunately, the film ends up a tad too long and has far too many subplots added, making a mess of the main story-line at most times.

There are parts of the film which work in isolation. Jaggu’s mother, played by Urvashi, worships just villains and has a puja bell that is made out of a gun, which is novel and evokes laughs. In fact, the way the film begins with P Ravi Shankar’s introduction, you expect the film to be fast-paced and slick. Sadly, it slacks to being a sloppy amalgamation of rather regressive jokes. Even if one considers the fact that these ‘masala capers’ are meant to be ‘no brainers’ and one must not look for messages, meanings and find faults at regressive and sexist portrayals of characters, the film by itself ends up being too long-winding with the climax lasting longer than it should. And the writers seem to be too confused too, for Jaggu’s character oscillates from not knowing Hindi in one scene to talking impeccable Hindi in another, wondering if anyone was keeping track of these inconsistencies at all.

Maybe if the makers had concentrated editing a pacy entertainer than keeping the excessive ‘mass elements’ for the front benchers, this film would have worked better for all audiences. That said, this one could be worth a visit to the hall for Darshan fans and also people who love their fare of hero-centric subjects with bombastic commercial elements.