SINGHAM RETURNS: A pair of earplugs could save a lot for you! Rest is all wasted! [2/5]

The consequences of a film joining the over-hyped ‘100 Cr’ club could be many but one you don’t really want to face in most cases, is its inescapable and obvious sequel. Rohit Shetty’s SINGHAM RETURNS is one of those. As a fellow cop in the team makes it loud and clear soon after hero’s grand entry on screen, “Gaanv se shaher badla hai par apne Bajirao Singham ke kaam karne ka tareeka ab bhi wahi hai”! Translation could read, “Only the locations have been changed and the settings, Singham is all the same”. Spot on! SINGHAM RETURNS is a mindless action entertainer that tickles your heart less and hammers on your head more. I hope it hints you enough to carry earplugs and a couple of pills, in case of severe headache!

The new playground for Bajirao Singham [Ajay Devgn back in his vest & khaki avatar] is the city of Mumbai where corrupt politicians force their own set of rules to rule. An Anna Hazare in disguise idealistic Guruji [Anupam Kher in an extended guest appearance] is unwavering about cleaning the filth called corruption and black money from politics but the evil forces including barely a sketchy politician [Zakir Hussain in his probably most attempted character on screen] and a phony holyman who immediately gets into his cool casuals with a glass of beer in hands when not in some public appearances, have their own vicious plans. Singham returns to fight for freedom, justice and enforcement of law in the system, against these mean minds.

Rohit Shetty’s SINGHAM RETURNS clearly shows his over-confidence in the most usual and sub-standard plot. An honest cop’s frustration and distress while on duty leads him to be transformed into a fearless fighter who can also go beyond law to teach lawbreakers a hard lesson. So far so good! So far some respite! But when you see Ajay devgn mouthing dialogues like, “dhoom machaani hai machao, par bike ki gati [speed] par nahin, desh ki pragati [progress] par”, you sure can guess where it’s going. And SINGHAM RETURNS does that often. Where the first half is quite alike any regular episode of the longest running cop-drama CID on TV [You can also find the loveably single-minded Daya here to act on his favorite, “Daya, Darwaja tod do!”, second half is more of Shetty-special shootouts, blasts and ceaseless gravity-defying goon-bashing sequences.     

The other part that doesn’t go well with the film is the love-track! Kareena Kapoor plays Avni who besides dreaming to own a franchise of salon, can be seen frenzied over the idea of her marriage to Singham. It is the least appreciated thing if you have especially come out to see a Rohit Shetty Action entertainer. On the performances, Ajay does what people love to see him doing. A macho man who is invincible, intrepid and heroic in every sense! Kareena irritates, well mostly! Amole Gupte slips into the skin of Chandraswamy like Guru of political influences well and succeeds in providing some not sufficient but good laughs.

At the end, a strict warning for parents! If the child artist’s ‘mala raga gheto hai’ act in Yo Yo Honey Singh’s ‘Aati majhi satakali’ song looks cute to you and your kid, it doesn’t necessarily mean the film is for kids! Stop taking your kids in each and every film you go for! It is like in between those blasting-flying-on fire SUVs in the film, you see a trapped Tata Nano being driven by Ajay Devgn and you go into serious prayers, “No, not this! Don’t! You can’t!” Watch it only if you’re one of those unfortunates who are still at home on this extended weekend! Rest, do not bother! [2/5]

THE XPOSE: One of the cheesiest suspense thrillers, aka unintentional comedy!! [2/5]

Fans who have had regular access to gossipy magazines like ‘Mayapuri’ and ‘Stardust’ would agree more that bollywood film industry has always been blessed with cheesy, salty and spicy ‘inside’ news pieces on link-ups, break-ups, regular tiffs between stars, catfights in parties and rivalries that run longer than the film on box-office. Now, if someone from those unsighted admirers would have made a film like ‘THE XPOSE’ taking references from here and there, it would have been easily an ignorable offence…but coming from Ananth Narayan Mahadevan, a veteran himself from the industry, it is a shameful cold-blooded crime to present all of it in a hasty, half-baked and horrifically bad light.

THE XPOSE, set in glamorously stylish 60’s, is a fictional memoir inspired by real life incidents happened in bollywood. So you have a moody, egoistic and bigmouthed superstar Ravi Kumar [Played by who else? The Himesh Reshammiya], a character modeled on yesteryear Actor Rajkumar famous for his attitude and many regular interferences on set suitable to his self-proclaimed image. How can you not find the connection when he compliments one of his co-stars on her dress that he could use the same for his house as curtains??

Then, there are a couple of sex-symbols who catfights in parties and bears strong resemblance from real-life contemporaries Zeenat Aman & Parveen Bobby. There is also a top music director KD [India’s latest sensation Yo Yo Honey Singh playing someone like RD Burman] who can sell the same tune to two different filmmakers. If you could do an elephant-eyed examination, you will also find visible suggestions of Sunil Dutt saving Nargis’s life from a fire mishap on set, a publishing house giant replicating Nari Hira of Stardust and hidden interest of underworld in the business. All that and an unfortunate death of a leading actress [Divya Bharti?? Who knows!!]! Everyone is under scanner and the frisky & frolicky fiction takes over the touch of reality!

THE XPOSE is stylish and sensational but cheaply designed, undeveloped ‘insider’s view’ to encash people’s thirst for scandalous ‘behind the curtain’ news. It gets easier if you already in sync with those intimations and indications before hand in order to relate and rejoice but as an outsider, you will always miss the punch here. Watching Himesh delivering lines like, “Main jo bol deta hoon, wohi script ho jaati hai” and “Style pe aap kaam karo, attitude pe maine bachpan se kaam kiya hai” makes you giggle and chuckle at the first but soon you will feel the juice getting either too sweet or too salty to enjoy. Baby-faced Yo Yo Honey Singh looks fresh for the screen and bearable when lip-syncing his own songs. Newcomers Sonali Raut and Zoya Afroz do it as been told and predicted. Adil Hussain brings some credibility in his shorter but smarter performance. By the way, the story gets narrated by Irrfan Khan playing a blackmarketeer at cinema-halls. No explanations would be enough to understand why this special appearance??

With nasal-toned singing, ‘ice-dream khaoongi, Kashmir jaoongi’ kind of inanity in lyrics, average performance, distasteful writing and a suspense that falls more in the grid of unplanned-unintentional-accidental comedy, THE XPOSE is one of the cheesiest suspense thriller that can be watchable if you are allowed to make loud comments on its idiocy in theatre. It’s the only way out to relieve yourself of the load it throws on your intellect. Sadly, multiplex culture doesn’t pursue that any longer! So, better leave it for a home-viewing! [2/5]      

BOSS: Another milestone in senseless action-comedy aimed to touch 100 Cr mark! [2/5]

First rejoinder:

I don’t recall when was the last time I wanted to cheer for the villain beating the hero to his guts out till I sensed myself ready to whistle for Ronit Roy in his final collision with Akshay Kumar in Anthony D’Souza’s BOSS. Reasons could range from my fondness for the prior [Thanks to Motwane’s UDAAN] to his completely black yet the most consistent performance in the film or it could also be my ‘controlled till now’ patience blasting and demanding nothing but someone from the cast taking a stand and whipping-thrashing & battering the character of Akshay Kumar for all the mindless action he does in the film. For me, the performance of DCP Ayushman Thakur played by Ronit Roy is my takeaway from the film! Rest is forgettable!

What is it?

Exactly. What was it? at the most, plot could be described best as a distant relative of all the recent mindless potboilers including Akshay Kumar’s own Rowdy Rathore, Khiladi 786 and hundreds of late 80’s Dharmendra/Mithun chakraborty popular action entertainers. No wonder, in the similar manner you see the hero being introduced as ‘in & as’ format only after 30 odd minutes in the film followed by opening titles in another 10-12 mins after.

Surya- the black sheep in the family of ‘adarshwadi Masterji’ of Banares [played by Mithun Chakraborty], is now in safe but dirty hands of Crime-syndicate Tauji of Haryana [Danny Dangzopa]. 15 years later, Surya [the one & only Akshay Kumar] emerges into a self-loved transporter who bashes up all the goons to save poor villagers but ironically also wears the hat of a money-driven contract killer. In one alike situation, he’s given instructions to kill none other than his younger brother. Shockingly, father also doesn’t have much option left than dragging his abandoned son into this with his powers to save the kid and thus starts the final journey to a picture-perfect happy ending sans my favorite villainous brother of the bride J

How is it?

Films like BOSS are made to run on the star-power, so it is all the way an Akshay Kumar film. You don’t really have to use your mental muscles to imagine in what manner the action, jokes or for that matter even the songs would shape up. Performances are loud, regular and totally in sync with the likings of its targeted audience. Only exception is Ronit Roy as the cold-blooded, merciless, power-driven lawman of his own set of laws. In one scene, when Akshay the Boss is seen jogging/jumping on the trucks [mind you, it’s not the regular track but a chain of trucks] while his first face-off to Ronit- the DCP, you can easily make a distinction between their intensity in the performance! At 2 hour 30 min long duration, it serves you ‘baasi’ ingredients in the name of entertainment.

Who should go?

Watch it if you are an Akshay Kumar fan. Watch it if you already have learnt the lyrics of the ‘yo yo honey singh’ songs in the film by heart. Watch it if Mithun Chakraborty was your first super-hero in Bollywood. Watch it if your mind-heart-soul still adore late 80’s formula action thrillers.

Who should stay away?

If you think Bollywood is changed! If you think entertainment doesn’t have to be formulaic! If you love Indie Cinema more than regular releases! If you believe cinema is a sensitive art form! If you still are reading my review!

Final outcome:

A Presentation of ‘Cape of Good Films’ [really??] Anthony D’Souza’s BOSS is another milestone in senseless action-comedy aimed to touch 100 Cr mark. I don’t see any hurdle in that because as the character of Akshay kumar would have said in his Haryanvi, if asked “apne ko kya hai, apne ko toh bass paisa bahana hai”! [2/5]