Kundah Shah serves a completely different dish this week from last week's Kya Kehna. Funnily enough, HTMK is much more his style of film than Kya Kehna but whereas Kya Kehna is a well-knit and involving film, HTMK is a collossal waste of tremendous potential and Kundan Shah takes a fall with this one.

The plot is great...it is inspired by a foreign flick but I cannot remember which one it may be...still, its OK to pilfer, everyone does and if it adapts well, why not!

Raju (Bobby Deol) is infatutated with crime reporter (Geeta Kapoor) who has her own show on television. One day, a murder is committed where Raju works and believing that he may have some information, Geeta comes to interview Raju. Not knowing anything but wanting to be with the girl of his dreams, he lies and says that he saw the murder take place.

She puts him on TV where he makes up the identity of the killer, who actually happens to be the killer (Shakti Kapoor). This prompts the murderous gang to want him dead; the police also want to question him and Geeta wants to hold onto him for the sake of her TV show. Great start...just wish that it had been equally well executed.

The plot continues to lurch up and down and the potential is always there for the film to have been a great comedy caper. But sadly, its not and it misses the bulls eye by a very long way... Slapstick is an extremely difficult thing to do and to do it well, one has really to have good timing and a flair for it.

Kundan Shah has a flair for comedy but has come a cropper in this one. Bobby Deol, for all his efforts, fails to get it right. He tries to be funny, but I don't think I laughed, or even smirked at any of his antics. The right man for the job was either Salman or Govinda who both play comedy very well. But its not so much Bobby's fault as the script...it lets the side down...what starts off furiously, simply has to slow down because we seem to run out of ideas of how to speed the film forward. Its apparent very soon after a few minutes into the film that the potential is very much there for a laugh a riot movie but which in fact tends to be somewhat tedious and silly... Kundan Shah seems unsure as to what he is trying to make..is it a slapstick comedy crime caper, is it a murder mystery (although there is absolutely no mystery) or is it a love story.

Perhaps he was trying to balance all the elements and as often happens, you try to do so much and end up with nothing at all...which is what HTMK is... Karisma Kapoor plays her role with gusto and is reasonably engaging. No one else really deserves a mention.

Anu Malik has inflicted a mundane score except for a couple of numbers. The title song is good and Lehliya has great orchestration but once the antra starts, it fizzles out into a big bore of a song. Baap Manjha could have been fun had Anu not sung it itself but is worth a listen. The other songs are dull.

I feel bad for this one, because I think it had the potential to be great fun...but it ends up being bit of a bore. Mind you, I stuck it out till the end...and for all those who are going to see it on dvd or video, use your remote controls to make it more palatable.