Basically, this proves two things. One, that audiences can’t be bothered with such things as plagiarism. And two, nothing succeeds in Bollywood like flat-out comedy.

What viewers care about is the fact that here are two summer movies which are sunny, and take-you-out-of-yourself funny. Partner is more family oriented because Dhawan has been careful to add a couple of kids in the first half. It has Salman in his trademark shirtless avatar cavorting on the beaches of Thailand, it has Govinda finding some of his old timing. It has the kind of plot which allow for a Rajpal Yadav, one of Dhawan’s staple comedians now that Kader Khan and Shakti Kapoor have waned, to play Chotta Don (a spoof on both the Don movies, new and old) and careen around with guns and sidekicks.

The best parts of the film belong to Govinda, who has been struggling to come back all of this year. He played a similar sort of character in Salaam-e-Ishq, a good-hearted taxi driver who finds love in the most unexpected place: here again, his love interest is played by the very sophisticated Katrina Kaif, a high-powered owner of a software company. The contrast between the desi, portly Govinda, and his ultra-chic ladies is good for a laugh. And Dhawan builds on it, with the help of his favourite hero, with crazy situations, and crazier lines.

Like David Dhawan, Sajid Khan is no respecter of sense. And of holy cows. His shows are full of digs at film heavies, and he has never been scared to poke fun at big producers and directors. His Hey Babby has Akshay Kumar, Fardeen Khan and Riteish Kumar as the three guys who like making whoopee with the pretties in Sydney without any commitment, and who get stuck with a baby on their doorstep one fine morning.

So, of course the film is filled with cracks that a baby will chortle at, and potty humour, and locker-room jokes. But nowhere does it turn vulgar or crude, which is a hard thing to do when you are filling your movie with promiscuity , testosterone, and because it is a Bollywood movie looking for as big an audience as possible, with lots of emotion, too. The baby gets sick, the guys pray for her. The baby gurgles, they go goo-gaa, and all misty-eyed. There’s Vidya Balan, too, as the absconding mom-of-the-baby, and her job is primarily to look pretty and be eye candy.

So there you go. Inane jokes, and simplistic gags, innuendoes and double entendres, all wrapped up in the most nonsensical of plots: that’s the secret of comic success. Dhawan has tried his hand at mixing emotion with the laughs and has come a cropper; Khan seems to have done better, but just about. Emotion-heavy tracks tend to overwhelm the laughter, and that’s always something to guard against; Hey Babby gets back on track fast, with the three heroes’ antics, helped along by Boman Irani. As well as an item number from Shah Rukh Khan.

Comedy has been out-running the other genres (romance, action) for a while now; the best movies keep the comedy tracks firmly up-front, with a garnish of romance. And the most accomplished among them, like the Munna Bhai movies, can make you laugh and cry at the same time.

But crassness of a certain kind has no takers. Rahul Rawail’s Buddha Mar Gaya, which had respectable actors like Anupam Kher and Om Puri up to no good with the big-bosomed Rakhi Sawant, was rejected out of hand. Clearly, audiences are still prudish and unwilling to compromise on certain things, including dirty old men.

Coming up in the first week of September is Indra Kumar’s Dhamaal. From its promos, it looks like a whole bunch of people— Arshad Warsi, Ritiesh Deshmukh, Javed Jaffri, Ashish Chaudhary and Sanjay Dutt — doing the most improbable things. With his incarceration and release on bail, Dutt is red-hot. Kumar, who’s been out of circulation for a while now, must be hoping that his movie will turn out ditto. Priyadarshan’s Dhol with Tusshar Kapoor, Sharman Joshi, Kunal Khemu and Rajpal Yadav, is up next. As is Bhool Bhoolaiyaan, both promise to be Priyan style laughter-riots.

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