We live in times where laughs are so sparse and where a cruel joke is just a Twitter/ X post away that when a genuine comedy comes calling, you are half afraid to laugh out loud lest the film quickly degenerates into the kind of lowly brand of humour that Bollywood has routinely bombarded us with over the years. In short, comedy which ranges from bawdy to banal, boorish to boring.

Madgaon Express is anything but. A heady mix of slapstick and situational comedy, this is a rare Hindi film in recent times that despite bursting at the seams with cliches and stereotypes manages to turn most of them on their heads, coming up with a bona fide laugh riot. That Madgaon Express manages to catch your attention and latch on to it till its finishing line is not too much of a surprise, given that it marks the directorial debut of Kunal Kemmu.

Kunal, a gifted acting talent right from the time he was a child actor for the better part of the ’90s, can ace any role. But hand over a comic character to the man and watch him run with it. The effortless ease, the interplay of background and foreground comedy, the ability to make a throwaway line more than just a throwaway line and pitch-perfect comic timing that have been the bedrock of Kunal’s comedic skills as an actor show up in ways more than one in Madgaon Express, a film which has also been written by him.

Madgaon Express is a fun ride in its own right which also brings it home by paying homage to classic Bollywood comedies, many of which form a part of Kunal’s filmography as an actor. There is the physical comedy of the Golmaal films, the Raj & DK-stamped quirk of 99, the confused chaos of Lootcase and, of course, the drug-induced euphoric comedy-of-errors vibe of Go Goa Gone.

It is Goa that forms the canvas on which the madness of Madgaon Express plays out. Given that the film is produced by Excel Entertainment, whose Dil Chahta Hai has resulted in many a Goa trip (and many more that have remained a pipe dream), it wouldn’t have been difficult for Kunal to sell his story to Farhan Akhtar and co. In many ways, Madgaon Express can be looked at as an exaggerated, almost ditsy version of Dil Chahta Hai, but one in which the fancy sky-blue convertible of the trio in Farhan’s directorial debut becomes an unreserved train compartment (hence the name Madgaon Express) in Kunal’s film.

The three friends in this set-up fall into the category of those whose unfulfilled Goa plan in college results in them giving it a go a few years later. So Ayush (Avinash Tiwary), who is now settled in New York, and Cape Town resident Pratik (Pratik Gandhi) find themselves on their way to Goa with close pal Dodo (Divyenndu). Dodo has swag and style but is living a penniless life. But, in what is a light-hearted commentary on how our social media lives are anything but our own, Dodo indulges in Photoshop quite often to post pictures of himself with famous faces.

But what should have been a dream vacation turns into a nightmare for the trio when they chance upon a bag full of cash and guns. That results in a chase both dangerous and demented that channels quite a bit of Dhamaal but still manages to remain originally its own.

Kunal’s writing is sharp and his understanding of comedy is contemporary yet classic and that enables him to cull humorous moments out of the most innocuous and even mundane. Even a small touch like a street sign that screams ‘accident porn’ instead of ‘accident prone’ will make you laugh out loud.

Like the three guys in The Hangover and Delhi Belly, the otherwise disparate band of boys in Madgaon Express are so much in sync that it automatically elevates the material. Pratik Gandhi delivers a curveball with his comic act while Avinash Tiwary gets an opportunity to showcase his versatility. But it is Divyenndu who makes Madgaon Express consistently watchable. The actor’s menacing Munna persona from his superhit series Mirzapur may have defined him in recent times, but let us not forget that Divyenndu — despite a then-unknown actor called Kartik Aaryan’s famous monologue — was the beating heart of Pyaar Ka Punchnama. Liquid walked a dozen years ago so that Dodo could run today.

I liked/ didn’t like Madgaon Express because... Tell t2@abp.in