The sepia toned credits sequence showing the inexplicable and unrelated shooting of inmates in a jail interspersed with shots of drops of water falling in slow motion set the scene for what qayamat aspires to be…more style than content with fast paced action and little suspense. Taking after its close cousin Brukenheimer’s mindless junk “The Rock”, Qayamat starts off with the token good Muslim cop Akram Sheikh (Suneil Shetty) in hot pursuit of terrorists. Bursting into their room, he deduces that there are three of them and because of the lipstick marks, one of them must be a lady. Holding a map of Mumbai with an L marked on it, he foresees dreadful doom. We are then introduced to the evil threesome, brothers Abbas and Ali Rehmani (Sanjay Kapoor and Arbaaz Khan) and the evil babe Laila (Ishaa Koppikar), caricatures from some third rate Batman film, as they start their murderous rampage.

In the meantime, we have scientist Rahul (Ashish Chowdhury) producing an antidote to a deadly virus, being kept in the lab. But disgruntled and jealous colleague Gopal (Chunky Pandey) somehow makes off with the virus and meets up with the insidious three. Without a care in the world as to their identities, the foursome and their stooges take hostages of some 200 people whilst visiting the old Elphinstone Jail, not unlike Alcatraz and threaten to unleash the deadly virus if their demands are not met. They want crores and a ship to sail off, quite clearly to Pakistan, clear when one of the stooges retorts that there is only one country, which harbours the enemies of India and a further conversation with “general Sahab”. Rather hilariously, when being faced with the vile threats made by the terrorists, the Chief Minister utters the words “how dare you” which certainly sends no shivers down the spine of the evil trio.

So what happens next? How does anyone get into Elphinstone Jail. Akram Sheikh puts forward that there is only one man who can accomplish this mission and he is at present rotting in one of their jails. It is no other than Rachit (Ajay Devgun), a man prone of fits and living in a state of denial. Reason for this…its time for flashback: the evil brothers were his partners in crime at one time and when Rachit falls in love with Sapna (Neha Dhulia) and wants to go on the straight and narrow, the brothers ran down the girlfriend. Believing her to be dead, Rachit escapes from Elphinstone jail and murders one of the cronies but ends up back in the slammer.

Rachit is a zombie who is asked to go along with the commandoes to rescue Mumbai from its dreadful fate. However, there is a nigger in the woodpile and all but two of the commandoes are gunned down and it is left to Rahul, the rather inept scientist and the zombie to somehow salvage matters. It is at this point that Sapna re-emerges and beckons her lost love to “come back” to her. Bouyed on by her dulcet tones on the microphone, Rachit attains super powers and a repetoire of daggers that come in handy as he demolishes the evil forces at work out to destroy the jewel of India, Amchi Mumbai! Will Rachit save Mumbai? Will the dull Neha find true love in Rachit’s arms again? Will the hideous threesome succeed in their mission and end up in Karachi? Will the traitor in the midst be found out? In the event that any of this is a mystery to you, see the rest of qayamat.

Harry Baweja makes no bones about the fact that he is making an action film and knits together a melee of what will appeal to your front bencher. And by and large, it succeeds in keeping the viewer fairly engaged. The fact that I fell asleep as our heroes delve further in the murky waters fo Elphinstone jail shows the tedium of what is ultimately so very predictable but I can see the allure that the common man may have with regard to the special effects and the heroism shown by knights in dirty water!

Ajay Devgun takes a break from more meaningful cinema and does what is required of him. It is the bad boys Arbaaz and Sanjay Kapoor who tire one down with the over the top monstrousness, especially Sanjay Kapoor who appears to have a hangover from his Koi mere dil se pooche days. Suniel Shetty in a small role is unusually subdued. Neha Dhulia makes a lacklustre appearance and no amount of coming out of the sea in a red bikini is going to make much of a difference. Ishaa Koppikar is headed nowhere. With a role as one dimensional as this and with her doing a “jack Nicholson” al la Joker to it, she comes off as nothing more than a Bindu reject.

The music is dull to the extreme. I believe one or two songs have found favour but the songs slow down the proceedings and I for one cannot remember even one tune from the film.

On the whole, if you want to see a mindless and noisy film, then qayamat’s for you.