Golmaal Again

Golmaal Again is a 2017 Indian Hindi-language supernatural comedy film written and directed by Rohit Shetty; produced by Rohit Shetty Pictures, Mangl Murti Films and Reliance Entertainment. The film is the fourth installment of Golmaal franchise and stars Ajay Devgn, Tabu, Arshad Warsi, Parineeti Chopra, Tusshar Kapoor, Shreyas Talpade, Kunal Khemu, Neil Nitin Mukesh and Johnny Lever.

The film was released in Diwali 2017. Despite clashing with Aamir Khan's Secret Superstar, Golmaal Again became one of the year's highest grossers, was a blockbuster at the box office and became the 46th highest grossing Indian film of all time. Its lifetime domestic net collection was more than ₹244 crores, while the worldwide gross ended at ₹310.98 crores. The film received mixed reviews from critics with praise for its humour and performances and criticism for its flaws in the technical aspects. A spin-off titled Cirkus was released on 23 December 2022.

Plot
Gopal, Madhav, Laxman, Laxman 2, and Lucky are orphans in an orphanage in Ooty managed by businessman Joy Jamnadas. Gopal is afraid of ghosts, Lucky is mute and Laxman has lisp. They are also aware of the local librarian Anna's ability to see ghosts and spirits. The boys find a baby girl outside the orphanage one night and take her in, naming her Khushi and caring for her. One day, when Madhav pranks and scares the timid Gopal in an empty bungalow belonging to Jamanads's friend, the loving Colonel Chauhan, a fight ensues between the boys. Gopal gets punished, which prompts Gopal and Laxman to leave the orphanage, and soon, Madhav, Lucky and Laxman also do the same. Khushi is later adopted by Col. Chauhan and his wife.

Some years later, Gopal and Laxman work for Babli Bhai and Madhav, Lucky and Laxman 2 work for Vasooli Bhai. The group reunites after learning about Jamnadas' demise. Returning to the orphanage after 25 years for Jamnadas' memorial service, they meet Col. Chauhan, who has become blind, and reunite with Anna and Pappi, another orphan from the orphanage who has frequent memory loss. They meet a girl who they think is the bungalow's caretaker, Damini and learn about Khushi's demise. During the memorial service, a businessman Vasu Reddy reveals the orphanage will be demolished and moved elsewhere in plans to make his own building. Anna and Col. Chauhan decide to rent out two rooms, which upsets Vasu, who wants the bungalow unoccupied. When the group leaves the orphanage and return home, a ghost possesses Laxman during departure and speaks in Nana Patekar's voice later that night, rambling that Jamnadas's and Khushi's deaths was murders, which scares Gopal. After the ghost leaves, Gopal and Laxman call Anna, who lies that the ghost is still in their house and suggests him and Laxman to move to Col. Chauhan's house. Later, the ghost possesses Madhav and prompts Vasooli to assign him, Laxman 2, and Lucky to evict Gopal and Laxman from Col. Chauhan's bungalow for Vasu, indirectly bringing the three back to Ooty.

Upon reaching Ooty, the two groups start fighting each other out of anger. Madhav, Lucky, and Laxman 2 try to scare Gopal into leaving the house, but Gopal gets possessed by the same ghost and beats Lucky and Laxman 2 badly. Later, Vasu assigns Madhav, Lucky and Laxman 2 to burn down the house, but Lucky also gets possessed by the ghost and also starts talking in Nana Patekar's voice, which scares the group. The two groups then decide to leave, but Anna and Damini convince them to stay for the birthday celebration, and the group makes amends. The four find that Gopal has fallen in love with Damini and force him to confess his feelings. While Damini and Gopal are talking to each other sitting outside, Pappi arrives and shows the photographs he took from yesterday's birthday celebration. However the group realises that Damini cannot be seen in those photographs and Pappi says that he cannot see any girl sitting beside Gopal. It is revealed that the girl they assumed to be Damini is actually someone else who is the ghost that has been haunting them, while the real Damini is Pappi's girlfriend. The boys get terrified and try to escape the house along with Pappi, Babli Bhai and Vasooli Bhai after the ghost confesses it herself. Anna arrives and stops them and explains to them that the ghost is none other than Khushi.

A flashback narrated by Khushi explains how her boyfriend, Nikhil Surana, a young businessman and Jamnadas' nephew, who is working with Vasu, had plans to obtain and demolish the orphanage and build an amusement park. When Jamnadas found out and disagreed, the two fought causing Nikhil to kill him in rage. Upon confronting him and threatening to go to the police, Khushi was strangled to death by Nikhil. With the help of Vasu and his henchmen, he managed to lie that their killings were accidents. However, Khushi's spirit came to Anna for help, who was surprised that the boys could see Khushi and eventually brought them to the house to help get justice for Khushi and save the orphanage.

Back to the present, Gopal thrashes the goons sent by Vasu while the rest of the boys, who wanted to stay away from the matter, get emotionally convinced to stay. They convince Gopal to stop chasing the goons and later almost manage to scare Vasu into confessing the truth, but Nikhil arrives before they can and reveals that there is no evidence to prove him guilty. This leads to a fight, during which Khushi attacks and nearly kills Nikhil but is calmed down by Anna, and Vasu convinces Nikhil to confess. With the orphanage saved, Khushi's spirit bids goodbye to the boys and Anna and departs to heaven.

Production
In July 2016, Rohit Shetty and Ajay Devgn announced the fourth installment of Golmaal series. Shetty again wanted to cast Kareena Kapoor who played the heroine in Golmaal 2 & Golmaal 3. However, she stepped out owing to her pregnancy and Parineeti Chopra was signed. After Tabu's entry in the film, Neil Nitin Mukesh was confirmed for the antagonistic part. Prakash Raj joined the film in February 2017.

Principal photography for the film commenced at Mumbai in March 2017. First schedule ended in April 2017. In June 2017, a major portion of the film was shot in Ooty. The filming wrapped up in July 2017, and post-production work was finished in the last week of August 2017.

Soundtrack
The music of the film have been composed by Amaal Mallik, S. Thaman, Lijo George-DJ Chetas and Abhishek Arora while the lyrics of the film have been penned by Kumaar. The first track of the film titled as "Golmaal (Title Track)" sung by Brijesh Shandilya and Aditi Singh Sharma was released on 23 September 2017. The second track of the film "Neend Churai Meri" from the 1997 film Ishq has been recreated to "Maine Tujhko Dekha" for this film in the voices of Neeraj Shridhar and Sukriti Kakar and was released on 29 September 2017. The soundtrack was released on 6 October 2017 by T-Series.

Release
20 October 2017 was announced as release date of the film, coinciding with Diwali.

Critical response
Meena Iyer of The Times of India gave the film 3.5 stars and stated that the film is full of laughs with no substance. Raja Sen of NDTV gave the film 2 stars, stating that Golmaal Again is "a marginally better film than Golmaal 3 and Golmaal Returns" but felt the film was too long. Rajeev Masand of News 18 gave the film 2 out of 5 stars and said, "Mercifully no cars are spun around like tops and exploded this time around, but the characters repeatedly bandy about the film's message like a disclaimer, as if warning you not to expect any more than they promise to deliver: “No logic, only magic.” Logic indeed is in short supply here, and frankly, the real magic the filmmakers conjure up is the ability to keep this franchise on the road for all these years with such minimal creative investment."

Box office
On its opening day, Golmaal Again grossed ₹30.10 crore net, one of the highest openings for a Bollywood film in 2017. The film collected ₹28.25 on the second day. The third day's collection was ₹28.5 crore. On the fourth day, the film collected ₹15.25 crore, taking the total collections to ₹102.85 crore. On the fifth day, the film collected ₹13.25 crore. The sixth day's collection of the film was ₹10.5 crore.

By the end of the first week, the film grossed ₹135 crore. The third week's gross was ₹1974 million. Golmaal Again grossed ₹200 crore after four weeks of its release in Indian box office. The film grossed US$3 million in its first weekend in overseas. The film grossed $160,000 in Nepal, and $400,000 in Pakistan in the first weekend. The worldwide collection of the film was ₹3 billion in its fourth week. Also it is the highest-grossing Indian film in Fiji. The film became the highest-grossing Bollywood film of 2017 Until Tiger Zinda Hai broke its record in 2017. Golmaal Again ran in cinemas for more than 50 days in India.