Jaadugar 2022

Meenu (Jitendra Kumar) is a small-town (Neemuch in MP, which is supposed to be crazy about football) magician who doesn't like football & sucks at it. His father was a local football champion (but could never win the local football tournament for his team), who died while on his way to a game. He wanted Meenu to become a footballer, but Meenu was very bad at it and could not be trained for the same. Since then, his uncle Pradeep (Javed Jaffrey) wants the team to win the medal that Meenu's father couldn't. Pradeep coaches a local football team that consistently performs badly at the local football tournament. The team has a ragtag group of players like Lalli (Raj Qushal) (who plays volleyball instead of football), Ramswaroop (Sandeep Shikhar) (who doesn't have a proper kit & is pursuing a music career), Dipa (Raksha Pannwar) ( a serious player and a woman, a mother of 2 kids), goalie Hemant (who is brilliant on his right side, but pathetic on the left). Avinash (Purnendu Bhattacharya) is the local MLA and sponsor of the local league.But Meenu has a different view of things. He blames football for his father's death and wants nothing to do with it. That makes him turn to magic as his profession, and he is good at it. His girlfriend, Ichha (Rukshar Dhillon), breaks up with him because she believes that while Meenu can fall in love, he can never be responsible (he never paid attention to Ichha and doesn't know anything about her). Months pass, and Meenu finds love again, with Disha (Arushi Sharma). Disha is new to town and Meenu sees her at a local wedding, where he is performing magic show. Meenu finds that she is a bone doctor and approaches her as a patient with back pain, but it turns out that she is an eye doctor. Disha finds out that he is bluffing and throws him out of her office. Later that night Disha is walking to an address late at night and is lost. She runs into Meenu, who guides her to the right address.Both of them slowly start falling in love. One day, when Meenu asks her to marry him, she tells him that she is a divorcee. Her marriage had caused a rift between her and her parents, as she had married against their wishes. After her divorce, when she went back home, she found that her mother had passed away, but she had not known because she had cut all contact with her family. So now she has decided to marry whoever her father magician Chhabra (Manoj Joshi) chooses for her. When Meenu questions her as to her choice, she justifies it by saying that it is her "choice" to heed her father. Meanwhile Pradeep's team "Adarsh Nagar Panthers" is about to be disqualified from the league as the team is hopeless. Pradeep begs to Avinash that he wants to fulfill his brothers dream. He was supposed to travel for that fateful match, when he got sick and his brother traveled instead and died. Avniash agrees on the condition that Pradeep assembles 11 players and a sub in 6 weeks time. Pradeep wants Meenu to play, but Meenu brutally insults Pradeep saying that he was responsible for his father's death and is not worthy to win the tournament. Pradeep is heartbroken and tries to commit suicide. This brings the team together. The team decides to register itself, but on the day Meenu is called by Disha to meet her dad. Of course, Meenu goes to ask for her hand in marriage and finds that her father is his old magic teacher. He places a condition in front of Jeetu that to marry his daughter, he must execute two miracles. The first one is that his football team must reach the finals of the tournament. The second one will be revealed later. Meanwhile the team registers with Riju, instead of Meenu. Rishu is a garbage collector from a different neighborhood. Pradeep also changes to name to Adarsh Nagar Sikandars.Meenu, who has always hated football, must now make the game his own to win his lady love. But the team is just a group of neighbors, who are only together because of their love for Meenu's uncle. They have only one good player- Riju (Shoan Zagade), and he doesn't even belong to their neighborhood. They have fraudulently said he is, for the sake of having at least one winning chance. Pradeep refuses to have Meenu in the team as Meenu has always abandoned them. In the first match, Meenu slyly injures the most useless player of the team and this forces Pradeep to induct Meenu into the team. But with Meenu now in their team, he encourages them all the time and uses his mind games and magic tricks to get them ahead in the game. He guilt trips Disha into joining the team as its physician to keep everyone fit and fine. She cures Hemant of his left side deficiency. Dipa moves to midfield to create opportunities for Riju. Finally, the team starts climbing up the rankings and ultimately reaches the finals. So yes, Meenu has executed the first miracle. Now it's time to learn the second one. The revelation changes things for him at his magic show (at the Kala auditorium, right after their semi final win); it happens right before the match.Meenu puts on a play about Disha's story, sparking a reconciliation between her and her father. Meenu's teacher gives him his second condition now. He tells him that he must make sure that his team loses the match the next day. His reasoning is that his ex-son-in-law divorced his daughter because he chose his family. He wants to see if Meenu can choose his daughter over his family. Meenu, though feeling guilty, decides to do so. Meenu reveals to Avinash that Riju is not from their neighborhood. Riju's shack is demolished. But unknown to Meenu, his friend has heard everything, and he tells Disha. Disha tells Meenu to just do the right thing.At the match, Meenu leaves no effort in making his team lose. They are up against the City Giants, who have 2 champion forwards and a national goalie, who has not conceded a single goal this entire season. But when it is his turn to take the penalty kick, Meenu's friend Lali spills the beans to his team. However, to Meenu's surprise, the team stood by him. They tell him that they are ready to lose the game as it could possibly mean more than his life and marriage. This was shockingly practical and so heart-touching. Maybe Meenu felt the same, because he changed his decision to make his team lose and scored a point with his kick. He and his team are now ready to play, but unfortunately, they end up losing, as their game was just not strong enough. However, they have won everyone's hearts as the underdogs.When the winning team is taking the trophy, one of the Sikandar team members hilariously gets into a tussle with them and challenges them to a fight off the field. Luckily, that does not happen, and he is dragged away. Disha's father agrees to their marriage, and all is well in paradise. But it gets better. Rishu, their star player, makes it to the national team, and the Sikandars are called back to play for the upcoming tournament, signifying that there is still scope to win the trophy.

Arushi Sharma

Jitendra Kumar