By Subhash K Jha, IANS

Many years ago the mythic actress Vyjanthimala always came to the audience to kindle a certain expectation. If a film starred her, it always meant there was a classical Indian dance to look forward to.

Now in this new age of crass conviction there’s Emran Hashmi who also brings an expectation. Every time he’s part of a cast audiences know he’d indulge in deep-throat kissing with his leading lady.

Sure enough Hashmi does stick out his tongue at his leading lady… and not in any way juvenile display of contempt.

The ‘adult’ situation finds the debutante heroine pulling out all stops for a longish love-making sequence which is meant to add value for moaning to this creaky groaning love triangle with shades of Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s JURMANA, about the Good Boy (Sonu Sood), Bad Boy (Hashmi) and the pretty girl who comes in -between them.

The sandwich ain’t as sumptuous as the debutant director Aaditya Datt would like the menu to suggest.

The narrative has more bark than bite. And even the bark has its dark patches where the director seems clue-less as to how to take his characters beyond their styling dressing and cool-dude speech patterns that makes them look like overgrown collegians looking for a college-leaving certificate in the canteen.

The narrative goes astray on too many occasions to enumerate. Sadly there are only three characters in the film, not counting the walk-on parts by characters (e.g Navin Nishchol as the heroine’s visiting father) who seem to have been invited just to flesh out the skeletal triangle.

Himesh Reshammiya’s songs are welcome breaks, though they add nothing to the sinking progression of the wobbly narration.

About 80 percent into the narration, the director - seriously debilitated by the absence of conviction and inner logic - gets mired into a series of absurdities. Suddenly, as it were, the Good Boy turns out to be the Bad Boy, leaving the girl between them as confused as we are.

“Why me?” she sobs to the Good Boy (before he turns bad).

Why us? We ask ourselves more than once as the narration cuts across all our conviction to serve up a picture that’s as patchy as finger-painting done by a 5-year old unruly kid in kindergarten.

The three performers vie with another for rolling their eyes and doing smirky somersaults with their facial muscles. Debutante Tanushree Dutta could possibly fare better if given better material. Here she struts around in a college campus in brief dresses bending down to retrieve fallen books for a generous view of her cleavage. That’s as revealing as her performing abilities get.

Tanushree’s two male stars vie with one another to prove who can give a hamburger more food for thought.

Emran Hashmi once again proves himself an adept kisser. But does that qualify him to pose as a hero?