Gopal (Ajay Devgn) lives with his wife Ekta (Kareena Kapoor), who is addicted to watching Indian dramas. He also lives with sister Esha (Amrita Arora) and a mute brother-in-law Lucky (Tusshar Kapoor). Lucky is in love with a deaf girl named Daisy (Anjana Sukhani). One night, while returning from his office, Gopal saves an attractive young woman named Meera (Celina Jaitly) from some dreadful goons. Due to the circumstances, both of them decide to spend the night at Gopal's friend's yacht.

When he arrives home the next day, his over-suspicious wife suspects him of flirting around with his female employees and having an affair with his secretary. Knowing how difficult it is to convince her with the truth, he invents a story about spending the night with a fictitious friend named Anthony Gonsalves. Ekta becomes suspicious and does not believe his story as she knows that he never had a friend by that name, and hence, she decides to write to Anthony visit her and to confirm Gopal was telling the truth.

Gopal meets Laxman Prasad (Shreyas Talpade) who has come to interview for a position in his office. He is Meera's boyfriend, which is not known to Gopal who asks him to pretend to be Anthony, and meet and convince Ekta that he was indeed telling the truth, in return for a job. Laxman agrees to do so, and everything goes according to plan until the address on which Ekta had written a letter to Anthony turns out to be real. Meanwhile, Gopal finds out that a dead body was found at the same location where he saved Meera from the goons.

Investigating Officer Madhav (Arshad Warsi), who also happens to be Esha's boyfriend, does not get along with Gopal. He finds out that Gopal was missing from his home that very night and that the dead person was Gopal's colleague whom he had threatened to kill over a spat. Madhav also finds out that Laxman is not the real Anthony. He asks Gopal to get Meera to the police station to prove that Gopal had been with her, and did not murder his employee. After three days and a lot of attempts, they still are not able to find Meera. In panic, Laxman and Lucky hire a woman called Munni (Ashwini Kalsekar) who needs money to get her boyfriend Vasuli (Mukesh Tiwari) out of jail. But Munni is kidnapped by the murderer.

In a rage, Vasuli comes to Meera's house, where Laxman and Lucky learn the woman was none other than Meera whom Gopal had saved from the goons that night. After an initial shock, they decide to go to the police station. However, Vasuli kidnaps Meera in anger. Gopal is later bailed out by Sawant (Murali Sharma) who is going along with him to the Lover's Point along with Madhav, Esha, Lucky and Laxman in tow and Ekta, Vasuli and Meera arriving later. Laxman frees Munni from the murderer. Gopal learns that this was a plot concocted by Sawant to frame him for the murder. The drama grows, as everyone attempts suicide (except Madhav and Lucky), much to Sawant's anger. Finally, Sawant goes crazy and kills himself. Ekta and Gopal get back together in the end.

Lucky meanwhile marries the daughter of the president of Gopal's company who happens to be Daisy and becomes the new boss, giving a shock to the others. Gopal and Laxman are the junior bosses while Madhav is a 24-hour guard for Lucky.

• Ajay Devgn as Gopal
• Arshad Warsi as Madhav
• Tusshar Kapoor as Lucky
• Shreyas Talpade as Laxman
• Kareena Kapoor as Ekta
• Amrita Arora as Esha
• Celina Jaitly as Meera
• Anjana Sukhani as Daisy
• Murali Sharma as Sawant
• Mukesh Tiwari as Vasuli
• Ashwini Kalsekar as Munni
• Vrajesh Hirjee as Anthony Gonsalves
• Rakhee Tandon as Julie Gonsalves
• Sanjai Mishra as Subodh Mehra
• Shereveer Vakil as The Killer
• Sharat Saxena as Babloo Pachisia

Ajay Devgn is paired opposite Kareena Kapoor. Amongst the rest of the multi-starrer cast, actress Amrita Arora is the love interest of Arshad Warsi whilst Celina Jaitly and Anjana Sukhani are paired opposite Shreyas Talpade and Tusshar Kapoor, respectively.

Originally expected to commence shooting for the film in Dubai on a forty-day schedule, the cast shot for the film in Goa on a twenty-day schedule. Shooting later continued in places like the Filmistan Studios in Mumbai, South Africa and Bangkok.

The soundtrack was released on 19 September 2008 by director Rohit Shetty and actors Ajay Devgn, Tusshar Kapoor & Shreyas Talpade on the musical show Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2009. While the film's soundtrack contains six new songs composed by Pritam for the sequel, the album also consists of songs from the first film. Lyrics have been penned by Sameer.

The choreography and picturisation of the song Tha Kar Ke is heavily inspired by Sivaji song Athiradee.^[11]

Joginder Tuteja from IndiaFM gave the film's soundtrack 3 out of 5 stars and noted, that "Golmaal Returns is yet another winner from Pritam and guest composer Ashish Pandit who delivers what is expected from a soundtrack for a film belonging to action-comedy genre. No one attempts to do anything exceptional or different from routine but walk the path which has been successful in the months gone by. The music may not go the Race (2008) way but does well enough to ensure immense awareness about the film due to its fast paced approach."^[12] According to the Indian trade website Box Office India, with around 14,00,000 units sold, this film's soundtrack album was the year's tenth highest-selling.^[13]

Reception

The film received mixed reviews from critics upon release, unlike its predecessor which was loaded with a positive reception. It mostly received negative reviews, though made an excellent budget of Rs. 300 million at the box office.^[14] Golmaal Returns grossed a huge Rs 120 millions in the first five days, surpassing Om Shanti Om.^[15] In the Mumbai circuit, the B+C centres had never seen collections like the film ever before.^[16] In the first week, its collection from box-office worldwide stood at Rs 720 million.^[17] The film was declared a Hit by Box office India.

Home media

The film was released on DVD on 10 December 2010. The release included a single disc edition with the film and special features being the making of the film, and three songs: "Golmaal Remix", "Meeoow", and "Tu Saala".^[18] On the Moser Baer release, it is one disc plus a bonus disc of Golmaal starring Ajay Devgn, Sharman Joshi, Tusshar Kapoor, Rimi Sen and Paresh Rawal.

Boxoffice

The film was a hit at boxoffice^[19] and the total gross of film was ?1.08 billion (US$16 million)

In 2008, Shakuntala Bhatia, wife of director Rajendra Bhatia filed a complaint against Shree Asthavinayak Cine Vision Ltd., accusing them of directly copying the story of her husband's film Aaj Ki Taaza Khabar (1973).^[20]