Sex comedy in B-town: Audiences ready, Censors alert

Sex and comedy sells well in Bollywood. And together, they are able to make for a success recipe. But while audiences are able to sample and savour the genre, sex comedies are few and much in India, given the censors' wariness of them. Hence, filmakers' are apprehensive of investing within the genre.

After experimenting with "Kyaa Kool Hai Hum" back in 2005, Ekta Kapoor is bringing the naughty flavour back with "Kyaa Super Kool Hain Hum" July 27. But she faced the brunt with the film's promo itself!

The movie's theatrical trailer needed to go through cuts to make its way as a humdrum"" and "sanitised" version to the theatres, and Ekta was clearly upset.

"We never had issues within the film's first part. I FEEL our society was such a lot cooler at that time," Ekta, who's aware her film gets an 'A' certificate, told.

"I think sex comedies in India have undergone an overly interesting phase of 'Delhi Belly', through a large number of humour even in 'Love Sex aur Dhokha', then we handled adult comedy in an overly biopic roughly way in 'The Dirty Picture'. Now I FEEL now we have hit a roadblock! My film doesn't also have sexual humour. It is only an adult comedy.

In the hot past, few films like "Kya Kool...", "Masti", "Yeh Kya Ho Raha Hai", "Mumbai Matinee", "No Entry" and "Mirch" touched the sex comedy territory. Sadly, not with stupendous success. But film historian S.M.M. Ausaja notes "this genre hasn't moved beyond the kitschy stuff".

"I remember Basu Chatterjee's 'Shaukeen' to be an excellent effort, however the same director couldn't recreate the magic with 'Gudgudee'," Ausaja told.

"I feel 'Vicky Donor' was an excellent effort, though conventionally it wasn't a sex comedy. So I BELIEVE there may be tremendous scope for sex comedies, but we'd like intelligent direction and good scripting in order that the film escapes the B-Grade cliches and makes a mark," he added.

Ausaja doesn't blame the Censor Board of Film Certification (CBFC), although it is wary of letting TV audiences watch such films before the 11 p.m. slot.

"I feel censor board is selective in its approach. The film reaching the censor board, however, is the second one step, the primary one being the film itself getting made within the mainstream, A-grade genre, which we do not see happening. Even the celebs shrink back from such films, I DO NOT know what they fear," he said.

Well, no less than actors like Riteish Deshmukh and Tusshar Kapoor definitely don't fear a thing, given the sex comedies they've featured in.

According to Tusshar, the genre has become "cool and trendy".

"Today, everybody is about for it. They're accepting a wide variety of cinema. Nobody is ashamed or embarrassed to observe a sex comedy. India has unfolded and we're being very honest with the publicity of our film," the 35-year-old said.

In fact, Riteish believes "Kyaa Super Kool..." gets a bigger audience compared to the unique 2005 film.

He said that "the audience has become receptive towards other forms of flicks. At that time, the audience bank was small but now it has increased."

Courtesy: Mid-Day.com