Watched the big historical action release of Maddock CHAAVA directed by Laxman Utekar. The film stars Vicky Kaushal in the lead as Chatrapati Sambhaji and Akshaye Khanna as the ruthless Mughal emperor Aurangzeb and the film focusses on their clash. Sambhaji as an important historical character of Maharashtra and there are various shades and different topics discussed and debated on him. However his battle with the Mughal army and torcher and finally execution under orders of hardliner Aurangzeb is discussed lot.
The film is supposed to be based on Shivaji Sawant’s popular novel Chaava and doesn’t cover other aspects of Sambhaji’s life, which we read in childhood in Amar Chitra Katha.
The film is a big budget actioner based on history and has lots of dramatic sequences. The film’s treatment of the subject is very clear and characters are either pure white or pure black. The film though based on real incidents also involves lot of larger than life frames and fiction too. To be honest I felt the writers and makers haven’t been able to make the film very gripping. The film starts well and then loses pace and then picks up and then loses and so on. There is lot of action but barring the final battle, I found the other fights quite unreal with loads of VFX. There are some scenes which are impactful and especially Vikki vs Akshaye get maximum attention.
The film has huge hangover of Bajirao Mast Ani, Padmavati, Tanaji and Jodha Akbar but is not close to either of them in terms of impact and emotional feel. The pre climax of extreme violence and torcher though from history but was very uncomfortable to watch on big screen.
Of the performances Ashutosh Rana and Vineet Singh leave a mark. Rashmika I felt was totally out of place. Akshaye Khanna as the uni dimensional maniac monarch Aurangzeb was menacing. Though he doesn’t have much dialogues but his look as the old Alamgir makes him the big bad villain. The film belongs to Vikki Kaushal who again pumps life in a real character after Sardar Udham Singh and Sam Bahadur. He has worked hard on the film and honestly it’s his hard work which lifts the film of the negative points.
On the whole Chaava tries hard to be a patriotic historical actioner but works only in parts.