Alert viewers will guess the big twist in Vodka Diaries within the first five minutes. What is to be done with the remaining 113?
Kay Kay Menon plays a police officer named Ashwini who sets out to investigate a series of murders at a club named Vodka Diaries in Manali. Ashwini is accompanied by an assistant, Ankit (Sharib Ali Hashmi), who is given to making bad jokes about corpses – he calls the one hanging upside down Batman, and complains that he cannot say “freeze” to another found in the snow.
Kushal Srivastava’s movie has several such groan-worthy moments, so Ankit is hardly the only dim bulb around.
The murder investigation gets sidetracked by the disappearance of Ashwini’s beloved wife Shikha (Mandira Bedi). The bodies seemingly come to life, and it appears that there were no murders at all. Is Ashwini hallucinating? Where has Shikha vanished? We should care, but why don’t we?
Vodka Diaries has more false moments than the mighty eye-lashes of Raima Sen, playing a femme fatale. The screenplay loses its way after the angle of Shikha’s disappearance is introduced. The ones who have guessed the direction in which the plot is going will have all the time in the world to ponder over why the talented Menon agreed to be a part of such dross. They might stay on till the bitter end, propelled by sheer wonder at how the plot will untangle itself.