Cast:Anupam Kher, Sharmila Tagore, Rajit Kapoor, Divya Datta, Avika Gor, Nargis, Shayan Munshi

Director: Arup Dutta

How does an actor who delivers a cracking performance in one film switch to become a totally different person in another, both out the same day? Anupam Kher rocks it in `Sankat City’, but settles heavily like a rock in `Morning Walk’ – there’s no lift, or zest to the way he plays his character.

Not that it would have helped the film any. It’s about a bad daughter-in-law ( Diyva) who promises to love her husband’s ( Rajit) father as long as he offers to invest in a new house. But it’s all gone as soon as Professor Joymohan ( Anupam) discovers a long-lost love ( Sharmila), and a connection he never knew he had. The daughter-in-law turns into a shrew, the son withdraws into silence, and the chess-playing grand-daughter ( Avika, the child bride in TV series `Balika Vadhu’), is reduced to a pile of tears.

By rights, this should have been a touching family film. But it struggles to extricate itself from cliché and predictability, and fails.

shubhra.gupta@expressindia.com