Khel Khel Mein: Secrets unveiled and phones exposed - 'public property' drama unfolds!

Akshay Kumar debuted the trailer for his upcoming film, Khel Khel Mein, on Friday. The movie features an ensemble cast including Vaani Kapoor, Fardeen Khan, Ammy Virk, and Taapsee Pannu. The film appears to be a chamber piece, with the cast of characters gathered in a room to play a 'game'.

In the trailer, Akshay’s character secretly checks out women online while being married to Vaani’s character. It’s implied that he and his male friends might have even bigger secrets. Vaani’s character proposes that they unlock all their phones, so every message and call they receive over the evening is visible to everyone. “Ek hi rule hai, hum saaton ke phone raat khatam hone tak public property hain,” she says. The trailer relies heavily on comedic sound effects and leans on stereotypes such as ‘funny Punjabi’, ‘nagging wife’, and ‘cheating husband’.

Akshay seems to be ignoring the criticisms about the age gap between him and the women he is paired with in his films, with Vaani being over 20 years younger than him. The premise of Khel Khel Mein is similar to the 2018 Netflix movie Nothing to Hide, which was inspired by an older Italian film.

Akshay, who had significant success before the pandemic with Sooryavanshi, has recently experienced a series of flops, including Bachchhan Paandey, Samrat Prithviraj, Raksha Bandhan, Mission Raniganj, Bade Miyan Chote Miyan, Selfiee, and Ram Setu. He also had an extended cameo in the hit film OMG 2, which he produced. His most recent film, the biopic Sarfira, a remake of the Tamil hit Soorarai Pottru, was one of his biggest flops in years.

Reflecting on this streak, Akshay said at a press event, “It is not that I have not seen (this phase before), there was a time when I had 16 consecutive flops in my career. But I stood there and kept on doing work and I’ll still do that. This is one film this year for which we all have done lots of hard work and now we are going to see the results. We hope this is going to bring good luck to all of us.”

Akshay has several other movies lined up, including Sky Force, Jolly LLB 3, and Welcome to the Jungle. Fardeen recently made an acting comeback with a supporting role in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar. Taapsee, on the other hand, has another release lined up; prior to Khel Khel Mein, she will star in Phir Aayi Haseen Dillruba.