Welcome To The Jungle Review: Farida Jalal Is The Surprise Package In This Occasionally Funny Film Ft Akshay Kumar
Welcome To The Jungle ft. Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty and Farida Jalal among others is directed by Ahmed Khan. Read here for more about it.
2 / 5
The bar for Hindi comedies is quite low, especially the kind that has been served to us in recent times. And in desperate times, does Ahmed Khan’s Welcome To The Jungle become a saviour? The film has a huge star cast, including Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty, Farida Jalal, Arshad Warsi, Raveena Tandon, Jackie Shroff, Johnny Lever, Paresh Rawal, Rajpal Yadav, Disha Patani, and Jacqueline Fernandez, among others. With a cast of approximately 35 actors, does this film manage to make us laugh? For a change, yes, but occassionally. However, it’s not devoid of the redundant body-shaming jokes, or slapstick and more. Read the review here.
Plot
Welcome To The Jungle is a film inside a film. A rich businessman, in an attempt to evade taxes and hide his black money, makes a flop movie, and on board, failed actors and directors. Paresh Rawal and Rajpal Yadav as Dev and Das are the directors, Akshay Kumar as Rajeev is the lead actor, Yeda (Suniel Shetty) and Romeo (Arshad Warsi) are gangsters who also play leads in the film, creating a rift between all three as to who’s going to take the spotlight. Jenny (Jacqueline Fernandes) is the businessman’s silly and blonde daughter who gets a lead female role in the flop movie alongside Disha Patani’s Nadia. She is a successful actor and Rajiv’s ex-girlfriend. Johnny Lever plays the businessman’s secretary in charge of getting the flop film right! The movie is about the Indian Army
However, the chaos begins when this crew, dressed in army uniforms, reaches a real village that is facing the terrors of Latara, a terrorist (Jackie Shroff). The crew thinks the villagers are also actors and a part of the film, and the villagers think them to be the Indian Army. From hereon, Welcome To The Jungle blends comedy with patriotism, morals and humanity. The second part of the film is most of that.
What’s Good?
The Film Is Occasionally Funny!
Welcome To The Jungle does have some genuinely funny moments, and the actors deserve a lot of credit for that. Most of the fun and funny moments for me happen when the crew reaches the villages. The confusion and chaos that come from the crew’s unawareness of the real village and the villagers create some hilarious scenes. Akshay Kumar, Suniel Shetty and Arshad Warsi are trying to overpower each other during the shoot, which is perfectly timed in the narrative. Farida Jalal’s emotional mother, whose incomprehensible vocabulary leaves everyone frustrated, got me laughing out loud. Even Kiran Kumar, as the son who not just understands his mother’s gibberish language but responds in Urdu, that’s even more difficult to comprehend. Some Paresh Rawal and Rajpal Yadav scenes (not trying too hard) also work in bits and parts. The film’s self-aware humour is efficient but not long-lasting.
The actors use their old film dialogues as callbacks, like there are callbacks from Welcome, Arshad Warsi using Johnny LLB dialogues, or Akshay Kumar’s Khiladi reference, which decently work in the narrative.
Performances
Akshay Kumar, as the failed actor Rajiv, trying to revive his career with this flop movie, successfully triggers laughter. He perfectly fits this role as the failed actor just doing it for money, and not because of any patriotic values and saviour syndrome. He has some perfectly timed expressions and dialogues in the film. Farida Jalal is hilarious, and we seriously need more such funny female characters in Hindi comedy films. Every time the actor is on-screen, you are bound to laugh. Suniel Shetty and Arshad Warsi are also decent. Raveena Tandon also plays her character with conviction and honesty. She is beautiful to watch!
What Doesn’t Work?
The Female Characters
I just wonder why can’t we have female characters in comedy films, for once, not for the glamour. Disha Patani and Jacqueline Fernandez hardly have dialogues, let alone the punchlines. While the film does not depend on making sexist jokes, it’s not even devoid of them.
Trying Too Hard
The film has way too many actors and is mostly trying too hard to make us laugh. All the actors turn to physical comedy time-to-time or exaggerated slapstick, or the typical body-shaming jokes with Kiku Sharda and Krushna Abhishek’s characters. The first half is basically blah with unfunny brairot content, and the second half changes the narrative entirely. Eventually, the gags and callbacks fail to make us laugh.
Second-Half
The second half of the film becomes about patriotism and moral values. The crew turns saviour for the grief-stricken villagers to free them from the terrors of Latara (Jackie Shroff). At one point, real army men also show up. The whole Jackie Shroff angle in the film feels forced and silly. Despite turning the tone serious, the film attempts to keep it light-hearted with jokes and quirks of the characters, but this balance fails to work.
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So Many Songs
Firstly, there was absolutely no need for a remake of ‘Uncha Lamba Kad’. There are several songs in the film, and we are not even wondering why!
Technical Issues
In many places, the dubbing was off. It was quite annoying!
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Verdict
Welcome To The Jungle, directed by Ahmed Khan, is occasionally funny. Unfortunately, our bar for Hindi comedies is so low that any film will average jokes, basic callbacks, and less sexist and misogynistic jokes would feel better. It’s currently running in theatres.
First Published: June 26, 2026 2:32 PM
