DIRECTOR: S Chandrakant

If you take all those tired jokes featuring meek husbands and nagging wives your inbox is infested with, and place them end-to-end, you will get this week's new Hindi film, Rama Rama, Kya Hai Dramaa.

Three couples, played by Rajpal and Neha, Ashish and Amrita, Anupam and Rati, go through the director's idea of a comic look at the institution of marriage. Good wives cook, and make tiffin. Bad wives are possessive and suspicious. Good men, and all men in this sad flick are good, go off every day to earn a living, and put food on the table. And what do their wives do? Berate them at every turn.

Ye shaadi nahi, barbaadi hai: old tenet, which could have been a passable comedy, given that there are enough crowd-pleasing lines. Sample this: arrey bhai, bloody fool nahin, beautiful. This to a peon in a bank, who loves murdering the English language, from harried cashier Rajpal, who, when he is not fielding calls from his wife, is busy accepting morsels of food from his pretty colleague in the canteen. Ashish Chowdhary is to be seen constantly clutching his brow, Amrita Arora slinking around in the bedroom, and Anupam Kher and Rati Agnihotri — the much-married, older, wiser couple — falling all over each other.

The only one trying to infuse some life into the proceedings is the talented Rajpal Yadav, who seems to have got a permanent fixture in stories to do with oddball couples. He's been the simpleton spouse who supports ambitious wife Antara Mali, when she wanted to be Madhuri Dixit. He's been the short guy with tall dharm-patni Rituparno Sengupta. And here he is with Neha Dhupia, who has three looks: a Rajasthani ghaghra-choli- clad creature, a salwaar-kameez- wearing housewife, and a virago in a deep red gown with a deeper cleavage.

This is low budget, low brow tripe: rama rama, kahaan hai drama?

shubhra.gupta@ expressindia.com