Tees Maar Khan

About the film

Tees Maar Khan (transl.  One who has killed thirty) is a 2010 Indian Hindi-language heist comedy film directed by Farah Khan and produced by Twinkle Khanna, editor Shirish Kunder and Ronnie Screwvala under UTV Motion Pictures, Hari Om Entertainment, and Three's Company. A remake of the 1966 Italian film After the Fox, whose story was adapted by Shirish and scripted by him and his brother Ashmith Kunder, the film stars Akshay Kumar, Akshaye Khanna, and Katrina Kaif in lead roles. Salman Khan and Anil Kapoor make special appearances.

Tees Maar Khan was released worldwide on 24 December 2010, on Christmas Eve. The film was a moderate commercial success at the box office, and is today primarily remembered for Kaif's dance number "Sheila Ki Jawani" and Akshaye Khanna's portrayal of superstar Aatish Kapoor, who works with Kumar's Oscar winning director persona. The theatrical trailer and title song of the film were released on UTV Motion Pictures' YouTube channel on 4 August 2010 for promotional purposes. The trailer premiered in theatres with Vipul Amrutlal Shah's romantic comedy Action Replayy, also starring Kumar, and Rohit Shetty's action comedy Golmaal 3 on 5 November 2010. Featuring music composed by Vishal-Shekhar, with Shirish composing the background score and the title track while also writing it, the film was Khan's only film till date to neither be written by her nor feature her frequent collaborator Shah Rukh Khan.

Plot

The Indian Police Force has successfully busted an operation to smuggle ₹500 crores worth of national treasure. The Interpol suspects that the Johri Brothers, a pair of infamous Siamese twins, are behind this. Due to the possibility that they will try to steal the treasure again, Commissioner Khadak Singh is assigned the task of securing the train that will transport these ancient artefacts, with no stops, back to the treasury in Delhi. Commissioner Khadak Singh suspects that the Johri Brothers will hire Tabrez Mirza Khan, a.k.a. Tees Maar Khan, a cunning conman, to steal the artefacts from the moving train.

Meanwhile, in Paris, Tabrez is arrested by a secret agent from Interpol. CBI Officers Chatterjee and Mukherjee are tasked with the responsibility of bringing Tabrez back to India via air. However, Tabrez tricks the people on the plane and slyly escapes on landing. As expected, he is soon hired by the Johri Brothers, who are desperate to retrieve the antiques.

To perform this feat, Tabrez steals some shooting equipment from a low-budget film and stumbles across Dhulia, a poor, small village that resides by the railway track over which the antiques will be transported. He pretends to be Manoj "Day" Ramalin, a film director and brother of Manoj "Night" Ramalin. Using this identity, he approaches Aatish Kapoor, a superstar who is desperate to win an Oscar Award, to be a part of the film he is shooting to gain an edge over the police and control the villagers. After Tabrez narrates an "Oscar-winning" period drama based on India's freedom struggle, Aatish promptly agrees to be a part of the film.

Production

Priyanka Chopra was earlier rumoured to play the part of Aanya, but that rumour was later dropped after Katrina Kaif was chosen to play the female lead.

The script is penned by director Farah Khan's husband, Shirish Kunder. Sanjay Dutt was confirmed to play the role of the narrator for the film. Farah stated in an interview that she wanted someone with a voice which people can recognise even in their sleep.

An entire train was made and 500m track laid for Rs. 7.5 million to shoot the climax scenes.

Soundtrack

The music of the film is composed by the music duo of Vishal–Shekhar and one song from debutant music composer Shirish Kunder for the title track. Lyrics are penned by Vishal Dadlani, Anvita Dutt Guptan and Shirish Kunder. The music was launched on 10 November 2010. The entire cast and crew travelled on a train booked from Mumbai to Lonavala for the music launch. Sonu Nigam has given 54 voices for the title track of the film. The song "Sheila Ki Jawani" became a chartbuster and fetched Sunidhi Chauhan a Filmfare Award and many other awards.

Release

Tees Maar Khan premiered in the UK, Fiji and Canada on 22 December 2010.

A mobile video game based on the film was also launched by UTV Indiagames.

Reception

Anupama Chopra of NDTV wrote, "Tees Maar Khan, adapted from After the Fox, by writers Shrish and Ashmit Kunder, is disappointingly limp and insistently low on IQ. The film has little of the effervescence and flair of a typical Farah Khan film," giving it 2/5 stars. Aseem Chhabra of Rediff.com, who rated the film 1.5/5, stated, "Even at two hours, the film feels like one long and tedious exercise in bad humour. Some people laughed during the screening I attended in New York City. However, most sat with glum faces, in a sense of disbelief ..... How could a talented(..?) person like Khan make such an unfunny film?" Behindwoods review board gave the film a two out of five-star rating and quoted "So is Tees Maar Khan watchable? Good Question. Very good question. The answer is 'Yes' if you are in the mood to celebrate. But watch it in theatres as the fun is only when there is a crowd laughing along with you. The second half can have you in splits." Taran Adarsh of Bollywood Hungama gave a modest rating of 3/5 in his review and said, "Farah Khan's brand new outing Tees Maar Khan will make the most absurd, bizarre and wacky cinema of yore pale in comparison. Not just your cell phone, even your brain needs to be put on 'switched off' mode at the commencement of this film." Nikhat Kazmi of the Times of India awarded 2.5/5 stars while commenting, "Sadly, Tees Maar Khan begins as a spoof a…

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