After almost all the critics calling this movie a ’must watch’ and giving it a rating of atleast 3 out of 5, it was imperative for me to treat myself with this movie. I am not a great movie buff and don’t go watch each and every movie releasing on every Friday. So you can say that I am a bit picky and choosy in what to watch and what not to watch. Frankly speaking I had lots of expectations from the movie. Since the movie boasts of some of the finest actors of Bollywood - Hritik, Sanjay Dutt, Rishi Kapoor and OM Puri etc. They are not only the best actors but are also most dedicated in the roles they perform. The past performance of Hritik in movies such as Gujarish shows the type of dedication he puts into his work.
Same is the case with Sanjay Dutt. After giving many comedy movies on a trot he has completely changed his appearance for Agneepath. He seems to have put on at least 20-25 KG for this movie. Same is the case with Rishi Kapoor. Hence it was apparent that if the actors have put into so much effort in giving their characters a perfect image, the movie would definitely be a top notch one. But Alas!!! The director has done such a shabby work that all the efforts of these actors have averaged out. The fine performance by these actors have become a stretch and you keep wondering through the entire movie when would that ’wow’ moment come for the audiences to see the perfect alignment of direction, acting and storyline.
Talking about the storyline, it was more than obvious that remakes don’t copy the story of the original movie and this case was also no different wherein the story is quite a bit different from the original movie. I would say it’s only 65-70% of the original story which has been retained. But what is strange is director has not made any attempt to change the remaining story to give it some interesting twist. Rest of the story has simply been dropped. Moreover the retained part has been ridiculously convoluted. I call it ridiculous because there are numerous instances where you feel like ’what made it so easy for these goons/ hero to do this now that was not possible earlier?’, ’what was the need for this character in the movie’, so on and so forth. Though there are some good parts in the movie as well.
The part when Hritik’s sister come to know that he is her brother and the background song was a touching one and has been handled deftly by the director. But when he goes to his mother’s place, the emotional scene has been botched up big time.
Talking about the actors and characters in the movie, I would say almost all of actors have given their best. And that’s the only good thing about the movie (except some of the songs which are also treat to the ear). But there is very little scope for them to live up to the expectations of the audiences since the characters don’t demand so much from them. Kancha has been introduced properly only in the second half, limiting his role to one half only. Rauf lala is a strange character who is a despicable criminal selling young girls. Vijay is his right hand, but, is a godlike figure for the community people running schools for young girls. How strange!! Then there is an ultra confused cop Commissioner Gaytonde who seems to be there just to help Vijay take his revenge from Kancha. Confused characters in a confused storyline!!
Overall this movie is a onetime watch only if you are a huge fan of either Hritik or Sanjay Dutt. Otherwise go for it only if there is nothing better to do at home.