Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
After a few minutes of watching ‘Rahu Ketu’, I had to ask myself if this film would’ve seemed funnier if I were 10. Not sure. But if I had a 10-year-old kids, would I take them to watch this movie? Definitely not. No confusion there.
The first few seconds of them film were vibrantly colorful, set in the beautiful Himachal Pradesh, where an old man starts to sing a tale with a puppet to an audience full of children. And just when you think you’re going to be treated to this creative ancient art form, the screen fills up with AI-generated animation. Maybe lots of viewers would enjoy the AI sequence, but I was completely disappointed. It screams: we didn’t want to put in the effort to create a lovely hand-made puppet show, here’s some AI generated stuff instead.
The basic idea of Rahu Ketu is actually interesting, it’s about how a writer brings to life two mischievous beings to life through his magical notebook, hoping the characters would end corruption in the region, instead, Rahu (Varun Sharma) and Ketu (Pulkit Samrat) become only bring bad luck and create chaos in Manali. So much so that people are terrified when they see them, sure that their presence would cause some problem or mayhem.
Manu Rishi Chadha plays writer Churu Lal Sharma, the custodian of a magical book that literally brings whatever’s written in it to life and is thus the creator of the titular characters. He gets it from Foofa (Piyush Mishra), a wandering spiritual oddball who feels like a tongue-in-cheek Sadhguru spoof. While Rahu Ketu tear through the town like chaos incarnate, these two men try to steer the duo in the right direction.
In a little twist, a girl called Meenu (Shalini Pandey) steals the notebook, so Rahu Ketu go on a mission to retrieve it, and fight the drug mafia along the way. Shalini Pandey is earnest in her role, which is that of a sly ambitious girl caught up with the wrong people. Rahu develops an instant crush on Meenu and of course wants Ketu to call her ‘bhabhi’.
Honestly, I was bored before I could even finish half the film and gave up on wasting further time on the un-funny story. Both Pulkit Samrat and Varun Sharma simply act like they are still doing some sequel of their hit comedy Fukrey. Although their larger-than-life CGI versions had some comic potential, it wasn’t convincing.
The colorful settings, and the scenic beauty of Himachal serve as the biggest scene-stealer in the film. And maybe Rahu Ketu miraculously gets better, sharper, funnier in the second-half, but I couldn’t push myself to watch the story beyond the first half. Give it a try if you’re in the mood for some mindless entertaining and do not mind watching something that feels like AI slop.
‘Rahu Ketu’ is on Prime Video.
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