Having crossed the threshold of 30, our heroines are usually relegated to the sister, bhabhi or mother variety and onset of younger and fresher faces, talent is cast aside for what is presumed that the audiences desire… fresh faces and little of nothing else. This is proved by the Celina Jaitley Factory, a new babe in the woods, all bikini and little else who with any luck, will add a few more disasters to her name and make her way out of Bollywood. But she isn’t the only one. This is an oft repeated story and one that is not specific to Bollywood… Hollywood does the same and it’s the likes of the odd Meryl Streep that survives the rules of what is essentially, a man’s world. So what do our established heroines do? They turn to direction and production in the hope of better roles and better cinema.
Hats off therefore to Manisha for trying something ostensibly different by making a film without the conventional love angle and based on two female protagonists... the sad part is that what may have appeared amusing on paper, translates on the screen as a dull and rather vapid comedy which fails to sparkle.

Baby (Sushmita Sen) is a brazen, outspoken and brash dancer, struggling to make it in films. Deemed to be too tall for the heroes in filmdom ( worth a chuckle), she is on the look out for accommodation in Mumbai when she comes across a rather docile spectacled Maria (Manisha) whom we find is an emotionally battered wife who now makes ends meet by running a bakery. However, the two become thick friends upon their first meeting and Maria lets Baby stay at her place in Mumbai. All quite unbelievable and far-fetched but then, this is a light comedy and one is not expected to take it too seriously.
Somewhat like Hera Pheri, they chance upon a phone call where a man tells his sweetheart that he possesses Rs 3 crore which gets the girls thinking of a plot to blackmail the man and make some moolah for themselves. Bay wants to move ahead in time and Maria wants to escape her humdrum life so in true amateur style, they decide to blackmail the man and make a phone call. The man delivers the cash but the girls find that the man who delivers the cash is murdered. Undeterred, the girls carry on.

Slight as the plot is, it could have been funny enough had the script been better or indeed, the direction. But Srinivas plays it fairly straight and plods his way through the plot which provides little laughs and leaves the viewer completely disinterested in the proceedings. Scenes meant to be hilarious such as Maria’s threatening phone call which has Baby is shock are puerile at most and not worthy of even a titter. Considering that it deviates from the norm, you would need something exceptional to keep the film alive but the script is so half-baked, that apart from the odd in joke (the tall heroine), it really fails to make for even amusing viewing, forget a laugh-riot.

Sushmita Sen is a classy act and again in Paisa Vasool, she proves to be much too good for the product that she is in. A complete natural, you feel sad that she is wasted in rubbish like this and not given more substantial films. Manisha lets Sushmita hog the scenes and for that, she is an equitable producer. She never seeks to give her character greater importance but makes little impression as the meek Maria. Music is ordinary and on the whole, the film has little to recommend it. I barely managed a chuckle.