Did you know Marigold is the name of a flower? You did? Oh well, tough luck then - this movie is not for you, because that is about the most interesting thing you come out with. Yeah, it’s that drab.

If we were to plot a graph of the level of interest in the movie against the 100 odd minutes’ run-time, the first hour or so would be pretty flat and close to the axis. By that time, when Prem’s ever-smiley character shows an uncharacteristically different shade - you pretty much don’t care which direction the graph is headed. Its exasperating when four stories try to unfold out of nowhere in the last 40 minutes. I was just relieved to leave the theater after the vertical drop in the last 10 minutes to run to the nearest available paracetamol.

They should have done something to pep the script up, considering the acting was pretty much going to be flat or over the top. Oh right! Music was the supposed solution to this problem - a break in the monotony. In the director’s own words, “Music, of course, was the key part of the story of MARIGOLD“. Excuse me, director sahib – what story? Unfortunately, the music did not serve its purpose. Music from Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy’s other movies was used a lot as being played in pubs and rickshaws. These older numbers were much more entertaining than the originals for this one. One thing I was looking forward to, after watching the promotional trailers, was the visuals of the songs. Yep, flat there too!!

One thing that was not dull though, was the animation used for transitions (they had an editor, you see). They were bright, colorful and well, extremely out-of-place and kitschy.

There is some attempt at labeling Marigold as Hollywood’s spoof on marriage with Bollywood, or something like that. Guys, let’s fix first things first - let’s try and make cinema first and then maybe we can talk about where it is from, and who can take digs on whom. Or were they, in the name of being Bollywood-like, just trying to give excuses for the innumerable problems in their own script?

By the way, readers, I tried not to sound clichéd and stereotypical by avoiding the following words - cliché, stereotypical, repetitive, yikes, eeeewww, Oh Gawd … you get the general idea, right?