3 Idiots Review

3 Idiots - directed by Rajkumar Hirani and loosely based on Chetan Bhagat’s 5 point someone is a Joy Ride, albeit not without its share of bumps and flaws.
The movie starts with a lot of potential and Hirani does deliver much of what the viewer anticipates, but again - and this is a caveat for serious movie goers - he does take your for granted and interjects the story with some nonsense sequences.

The movie starts off with Madhavan’s narration as the two college chuddy buddies (i.e. Madhavan a.k.a. Farhan and Sharman a.k.a. Hari) are searching for their college buddy Ranchoddas Shamaldas Chanchad a.k.a. Rancho (Aamir Khan) and the movie dives into a flashback – straight to the ragging scene which, by the way, is a complete deja-vu of the Munnabhai Ragging scene (People Dancing in Undies, etc.).
Enter Rancho, a genius and a no nonsense taker as he hits his senior hard where it hurts the most. This is the point where Madhavan says,"Humne to Physics Padha tha.. Us ne apply kiya!"
As the rest of the movie unfolds, Hirani comes to the point as he makes Rancho criticize the education system which is designed to produce crammers or human-machines. Rancho is of the view that the main aim of our education system should be to teach the real stuff, and not just make students cram everything from the books!
I won’t reveal anything beyond this as it would take the fun out of the movie.

Coming to the actors, although Aamir, Madhavan and Sharman have done justice to their roles and there are shades of brilliance in each one of them, they don’t quite pass off as 19 something olds. Each of them looks way old to be a college student, but on the other hand, I can’t imagine any other actors capable of delivering such good performances as Aamir, Madhavan and Sharman have done. In my opinion, we desperately need some dependable teenage actors so that we don’t have to depend on Aamirs and Shah-Rukhs to potray love-struck college students anymore.
Kareena doesn’t have the screen time of a full-fledged lead heroine, but she does her part well. Boman Irani is outstanding as Viru Sahastrabudhhe (famous as Virus among the students), the cunning director of Imperial College of Engineering. Mona Singh has done a good job as Kareena’s older sister.
At this point, I would like to mention the name of Omi Vaidya a.k.a Chatur Ramalingam, the super-crammer typical front bencher who either nauseates his roommates by his continuous farts (thus, his nick name Silencer), or disturbs other students by secretly shoving porn magazines under their dormitory doors, that too on the night before the exam day. Coincidentally, he’s very bad at Hindi and Hirani has taken full advantage of this quality in one of the most hilarious scenes of the movie. Watch out for this Omi and his Hindi!

The movie is not a through and through comedy and Hirani has tried to convey some very relevant messages which I believe are very much applicable to today’s grades driven society. A society which is driving thousands of students to suicide every year. A society where no value is given to education or innovation. It’s just about grades, grades and freakin’ grades! This is the reason that majority of Microsoft’s workforce is Indian, but, we don’t have a Google or an Apple of our own to boast about.

Some of the scenes are totally idiotic though! Like the very first scene in which a plane is made to land back or the pre-climax baby-delivering scene. Such scenes are an insult to the intelligence of the viewer. Also, some of the one liners by Aamir have been heard by every internet/mobile user through forwarded mails or SMS’s. But at the end of the day, this is a comedy movie and “Aal is Well :)”.

I’ll conclude by saying that 3 Idiots is worth your money and time, but don’t keep Munnabhai standards in mind, or you ought to get disappointed.

I’ll go with a 3.25/5 for Aamir, Hirani and the Noble Cause.