Written by: Aiza Azam
Posted on: February 26, 2016 | 
Mohib Mirza as Vicky, Sanam Saeed as Alia and Adeel Hashmi as Jehangir in film 'Bachaana'
It could have been much more. The very talented Sanam Saeed as Alia, eye candy Mohib Mirza as Vicky, and, most enticingly, a villainous Adeel Hashmi as Jahangir, together form a promising cast. The filmmakers chose an ideal location in the form of breathtakingly beautiful Mauritius. Even the storyline wasn’t altogether bad. Newlywed Indian couple Alia and Jahangir arrive for an overnight stay in Mauritius, intending to head out to South Africa to join Jahangir’s family. Unbeknownst to Alia, her husband is a drug dealer who uses unsuspecting young girls as mules to ferry his cargo through Mauritius. Jahangir disappears and leaves Alia with mysterious instructions to carry a backpack to the airport. When she finds out it contains drugs, she takes flight, and Vicky, a Pakistani cab driver she met earlier, becomes her unwitting rescuer.
Unfortunately, there the promise of more dies a bad death. The plot falls into repetition and what follows over the next hour and half is a series of evasive measures as Alia and Vicky keep trying to escape from Jahangir and his henchmen, unknowingly running away from a DEA agent at the same time who is trying to help them. Fortunately, the audience is treated to some gorgeous scenery, its only saving grace, as they hop and skip all over the islands. The script is bland with some desperate humor shoved in every now and then (read bathroom jokes and mock nationalistic pride). Sanam Saeed’s acting prowess is wasted, though she holds her own with the little she is given. The much beloved Adeel Hashmi is unfortunately relegated to delivering sparse, cheesy dialogue and a few dirty looks. Oh, and a previous Hum Films venture, 'Bin Roye', got a surprise shout out in one scene enacted inside a cinema house.
The general feel you walk away with is that you had two hours to kill and that’s the only reason you bought the ticket. The reason it disappoints so is because in the last few years, especially 2015, Pakistan has seen a large number of very impressive films, with real guts and talent, come out and raise the bar ever higher. So when a movie comes along that doesn’t make you feel it’s trying very hard, it’s difficult to be too forgiving.
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