Hera Pheri review :
Most Bollywood buffs know the 2000 wala Hera Pheri where Paresh Rawal, as Baburao Ganpatrao Apte, stole the show from its main heroes Akshay Kumar and Sunil Shetty. But not many may recall that another fine action comedy called Hera Pheri had set the box office on fire long before this one.
This 1976 Hera Pheri was directed by the late great Prakash Mehra whose Zanjeer (1973) had turned Amitabh Bachchan in to an overnight superstar. Here, he repeated Bachchan along with Vinod Khanna who play besties Ajay and Vijay. They are chors who get entangled in a larger 'hera pheri' wali gang and eventually, the close friends turn in to sworn foes...
Hera Pheri cleverly blends Amitabh's comic timing with Vinod's brawn to make an ideal entertaining fare which was lapped up by the audience that time as well as in its multiple re-runs in the '80s and '90s. In fact, my first theatrical experience was as late as 1998 when it was re-released in Mumbai under a new name 'Do Chor'.
Beauty Queen Saira Banu got top billing on seniority basis. She played a trickster with an agenda of her own. Admittedly, her chemistry with Big B was quite thanda in comparison to Vinod's romantic interludes with the lovely Sulakshana Pandit. Incidentally, Pandit was a last minute addition to the cast replacing the elitist Mallika Sarabhai who quit the movie after shooting a few scenes.
The main villain - roly poly Pinchoo Kapoor - was a bit of a letdown though. The film deserved a solid villain to face the two macho stars. Except the title song, the music by Kalyanji Anandji was also so-so.
Nevertheless, Hera Pheri became one of the biggest hits of 1976 and Mehra promptly planned his next blockbuster repeating Bachchan and Khanna. That one was called Muqaddar Ka Sikandar!!
Regards,
Sumeet Nadkarni.
