Three years in the making, Josh is inspired by West Side Story and tells the story of two rival gangs. Max (Shahrukh Khan) and Shirley (Aishwarya Rai) are siblings, twins in fact and live in Vasco, in Goa.

For some inexplicable reason, there are two gangs who loathe each other and fight each other for no apparent reason. Prakash (Sharad Kapoor) is the head of the Bichoo gang whereas Max heads the Eagles gang. There appears to be nothing in dispute and hence one simply has to put it down to personal enmity.

Rahul (Chandrachur Singh) who is Prakash's brother, returns from Bombay and proceeds to fall in love with Shirley. Although Shirley is at first mocking and dismissive, love blossoms soon enough. This should have been the central cause for further enmity between the rival gangs but is left untapped until towards the end of the film. Instead, we have a plethora of fights over trespassing on either's gangs territory or trying to be one up on the other, etc.

There is also the added plot of forced repatriation of property that was abandoned by the British when they left India and which had been claimed by illegal tenants with no title to the land. This strand plays a role in the final climax between Prakash and Max.

Josh comes laden with expectations and hence is that much more of a disappointment. Mansoor Khan has made a film without much of a plot and although you expect the film to kick start at some point, it fails to take off. It simmers at points but refuses to come to the boil. And for this, Mansoor Khan must take the blame for not being able to flesh out his "inspired" story and ending up with a meandering script.

Shahrukh Khan has a thankless role in that his character is almost completely one dimensional. The character only comes to life in some very short scenes that he has with his sister but these scenes are too few and far between. He walks through the film with a sneer on his face but I do not think that he could have done very much else with his role.

Aishwarya Rai is extremely natural and looks exquisite. Given time, and if she makes the right choices, I would imagine that she should be able to attain quite an impressive body of work.

The surprise of the film must be Chandrachur Singh. After the thankless role in Kya Kehna, he has a meaty role here, almost the role of the narrator, the person who moves the story forward. And he does this extremely well. In terms of length, it may even be longer than Shahrukh's. Sharad Kapoor has the same problem as Shahrukh and after a while, is sidelined in the film. I do not think that he should count heavily on this film working wonders for him.

Priya Gill, in a special appearance is completely wasted. Perhaps she liked the idea of being paired with Shahrukh Khan but she does not have a role which makes any impression at all. Musically, Sailare Sailaru is a hit already as is the Shahrukh Khan duet, rather well sung by Shahrukh incidentally. The duet Hai mera dil is a nice song but I noticed that many of the audience left at this point, probably out of boredom or to have their cigarette/toilet break. I am not sure of how many came back.