Malayalam cinema is not the same as Telugu or Tamil, but Bollywood’s one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t see the difference selfieobserves Sukanya Verma.

The last time Akshay Kumar appeared on screen, He played a movie star telling his colleague on the run to admit his crime after accidentally hitting some kind of fan on the street.

He also plays a movie star in his latest movie, only this time he’s at the mercy of his biggest fan’s wrath over a driver’s license.

The crisis in selfie is infinitely smaller, but the media circus it creates is similar to the spoofic outcry in An action hero.

The focus of the narrative is on the state of affairs selfie‘s Uproar is the age-old link between movie people and their fans, where the latter’s only nightmare is that their idol doesn’t turn out as they dream, a scenario captured in Shah Rukh Khan’s fan.

Hindi remake by director Raj Mehta driving licenceLal Jr.’s Malayalam hit, penned by the late Sachy, chronicles a no-nonsense superstar and a motor vehicle inspector squabbling over pride and licensing.

Malayalam cinema is not the same as Telugu or Tamil, but Bollywood’s one-size-fits-all approach misjudges the difference.

Where Sachy’s narrative nuances and lead actor Prithviraj’s towering complexity escalated his storm in a teacup into a believable struggle for privilege and entitlement, selfie‘s need to amplify an already exaggerated discord only underscores the smallness of the problem, rather than offering a glimpse of human error.

Over mat karAkshay Kumar scoffs at a guy towards the end of the film who starts off by giving a little dedication speech to his fans.

The politics of seriousness of the actor — an image-conscious celebrity known for paying the highest income tax in the country, apologizing after endorsing harmful tobacco, endorsing menstrual hygiene at Nandu and the world and magnanimously agreeing, just three-quarters of the way to take a movie full of women or to announce his decision give up his Canadian passport shortly before the release of selfie — makes him tailor-made for the role.

selfie plays with its self-aggrandizing imagery and, unlike the original, is also a bit sympathetic to its fan.

In driving licencethe common man is made to eat a humble cake at every crossroads.

Here he gets a moment or two herogiri in Emraan HashmI’s smart skin. For all his eagerness, Hashmi takes a bit of a haughtiness for the role and can’t quite do a ‘bechara‘.

Another key change is the Superstar’s predicament.

In the original, Prithviraj’s irritation stems from his personal problems and frustration at not being able to accompany his wife for medical treatment abroad. In the remake, the hero is far less irritable and his wife is perfectly healthy.

And so much ado about nothing begins when Bollywood star Vijay Kumar (Akshay) arrives in Bhopal for a shoot.

Due to a bureaucratic glitch, his driver’s license is absent, which he desperately needs to film a car sequence and save the panicked producer from his inflated budget before he and his wife (Diana Penty, her emerald and diamond ring is all that caught my eye is) and welcoming her baby out of surrogacy (Raj Mehta’s superficial preoccupation with fertility continues afterwards Good Newwzdealing with IVF pregnancy).

Hiring a stunt double would have saved him a world of trouble, but where’s the fun in that?

Enter his biggest fan and RTO inspector Om Prakash Aggarwal (Hashmi).

Both Om and his school-age son are Vijay’s biggest admirers and take the first opportunity to meet their sweetheart and speed up his paperwork. But a stupid misunderstanding gets in their way, leading to a war of egos.

This conflict is fueled for foolish motives by Om’s wife’s darling (a spunky but underused Nushrratt Bharuccha), a faded, aging actor (a droll Abhimanyu Singh) whose cheesy comedy track is forced into the central plot. Ditto for the bumbling local politician (Meghna Malik) who tries to make the most of Vijay Kumar’s star presence in her jurisdiction.

If there are any genuinely funny moments at all, they involve Akshay and his fidgety, flamboyant producer Akashdeep, whose better half played Sheeba Khaladi‘s heroine in its third release, Mr Bondwhich was released in 1992, the same year that two of the actors Akshay dance around selfie – Adah Sharma and Mrunal Thakur – were born.

But the Bollywood hero doesn’t age, nor does he do anything wrong.

He will pass all tests.

He will answer all questions.

He will win over his fans.

He will defeat his enemies.

He will have the last word.

He’ll even strike up a romance with a heroine half his age, but she’ll be the one with issues ranging from bloating to fertility.

Pose next to him at your own risk and you’ll soon find that the hero you want isn’t always the hero you need.

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