Kaamyaab asks us to do something that we don’t
usually do –
shift focus from the hero to the actor 
in the periphery of the frame.
The bit player who has a few lines
– like the henchman who runs in 
to say something to the villain,
the doctor who delivers the bad news 
that the lead has only six months to live,
or the lawyer who loses in court.
Basically the men and women 
you see in countless movies
but whose names you don’t know 
because they aren’t stars.
They aren’t even character actors.
They occupy that nebulous 
recognizable-yet-anonymous slot of celebrity.
Sudheer, played by a wonderfully frayed, fumbling,
tragi-comic Sanjay Mishra, is that man.
Sudheer’s first film was 
Heera Moti in Hong Kong
in which he played the man standing 
behind the dead body.
The highlight of his career was playing the
henchman Shera whose signature line –
Bas, enjoying life aur option kya hai? 
– became a big hit.
Over the decades, 
Sudheer has done 499 films.
He’s now a retired recluse whose biggest
joy is his alcohol and his granddaughter.
After a botched up television interview, 
in which he sourly declares,
‘character actor ko aloo kaha jaata tha’
and ‘darshakon ke dilo mein 
sirf hero baste hain,’
Sudheer decides that he must do his 500th film 
and complete his oeuvre.
Writer-director Hardik Mehta, who co-wrote
the dialogues with Radhika Anand,
tells Sudheer’s story 
with empathy and affection.
He keeps the humor intact with amusing recreations
of film scenes from the 70s and 80s.
He brings together many of the actors who
actually lived this life
– Avtar Gill, who plays a version of himself,
Lilliput, Birbal, Guddi Maruti
and Viju Khote who is best remembered 
for playing the iconic Kaalia in Sholay in 1975.
You remember Gabbar Singh’s killer line
– ab tera kya hoga Kaalia?
Khote passed away last year 
and Kaamyaab is dedicated to him.
Incidentally he has 443 credits 
on IMDB as actor.
Hardik is a keen observer of the film industry
and he gets the details exactly right.
Sudheer’s white boots and wig, the harrowed 
production head on the shoot,
the slightly oily but charming 
casting director Dinesh Gulati.
Deepak Dobriyal is terrific as Gulati who,
as gatekeeper to Bollywood,
enjoys his own unique stardom.
The motto of his company is 
‘no couch, only casting.’
At Gulati’s office, overrun by aspiring
actors, beverages are served in mugs
that have Gulati’s own quotes on them.
At one point, he tells Sudheer to drink juice
because glow utar raha hai.
The textures of the film are real 
but not gritty.
Hardik gives us an unvarnished view of what
life is like for artists in the lower echelons.
Each day is a struggle to retain your optimism
and your dignity.
The film has heart but it doesn’t deliver
the emotional heft or depth
that a showbiz film like Luck By Chance did 
because the writing isn’t sharp enough.
Hardik relies too heavily on 
Sudheer and Gulati
– the other characters, including Sudheer’s daughter, 
his close friend and his neighbor,
have too little flesh on them.
The star in the film, appropriately muscular
and entitled, is especially bland.
I understand that this is a film 
about the sidekick
but surely the hero could have 
a smidgen of personality.
Sanjay Mishra, with his droll expressions 
and unsentimental manner,
doesn’t let Kaamyaaab slip into melodrama
but the climax, set in Sudheer’s 
granddaughter’s school, feels too staged.
Kaamyaab throbs with a nostalgia 
for old-school Bollywood films,
many of which were horribly cheesy, 
but they had a certain innocence.
The film celebrates that innocence and 
the sheer awfulness of those films.
But it doesn’t acknowledge that 
the industry is more fluid now.
The prime exhibit being Nawazuddin Siddiqui
whose blazing talent has propelled him 
from a side actor to hero.
The songs by Rachita Arora 
don’t add much either.
But Kaamyaab does serve as a lightweight and
necessary ode to the hundreds of actors
who we know and yet don’t know.
Which makes it worth watching.
You might also want to check out Hardik’s
National Award-winning documentary
Amdavad Ma Famous, about the kite flying festival
in Ahmedabad.
It’s terrific.
