Kaalakaandi: Five reasons to watch this Saif Ali Khan starrer

Saif Ali Khan's recent releases might have failed to make a mark at the box office but he is back with Kaalakaandi. A dark comedy exploring how six Mumbaikars deal with life, Kaalakaandi is being directed by debutant Akshat Verma (the scriptwriter of Delhi Belly). It hits the theaters on January 12. Here are five reasons to watch Kaalakaandi.

Saif Ali Khan

Saif Ali Khan's last two outings - Rangoon and Chef - may not have found many takers at the box office, but Saif's performance in both the projects was received well. With Kaalakaandi too, we have high hopes from Saif. In the film, his character undergoes a huge flip on discovering that he is suffering from stomach cancer. In some crooked way, Saif ends up taking 'acid' one night and the film captures everything from there.

Akshat Verma

Helming this dark comedy is debutant director Akshat Verma. But his craftsmanship is not new to the industry. He earlier penned the script of Imran Khan's Delhi Belly which went on to redefine the genre of dark comedies in the Hindi film industry. Kaalakaandi's trailer has already started the debate of it being similar to Delhi Belly. But as long as a compelling script is teamed up with good direction and a quality set of actors, we don't really mind.

Rest of the cast

Apart from Saif Ali Khan, Kaalakaandi also stars actors like Deepak Dobriyal, Vijay Raaz and Kunaal Roy Kapur. Raaz was seen in Monsoon Shootout and Kunaal was also there in Delhi Belly. Kaalakaandi also has Neil Bhoopalam, Shobhita Dhulipala, Isha Talwar, Nary Singh and Akshay Oberoi.

A story about life, death and karma

Kaalakaandi's plot is also no less interesting. The official synopsis of the film reads, "Kaalakaandi is a dark comedy based on three different stories in Mumbai where fate intertwines and destinies bump into each other. Kaalakaandi (a Marathi slang term for when things go disastrously wrong) is a story about life, death and karma!". In between, Saif also decides to take some ‘acid’ (a drug called lysergic acid diethylamide) and have the time of his life. Psychedelic films are anyway an unexplored genre in the Hindi film industry and that in itself makes for an intriguing premise to build a story on for Akshat.

A film on Mumbai underworld?

Kaalakaandi also works in the cause-and-effect relation between Mumbai and its dark and neglected underbelly -- the underworld. In an interview earlier, Akshat said, "It’s just a nod to the underworld. The characters in my films are the ones on its fringes. They’re like the messenger boys. They have ambition, they are on the outside, but want to be up there. Any criminal enterprise also has an administrative aspect. No one joins a criminal enterprise wanting to be a clerk. But there are those who do that job and it doesn’t stop them from wanting to be the don. That’s the kind of underworld in my film."