On this occasion, I am not sure if I got the movie the first time round or not. A lot of individual things registered, some positive, some not so positive but I’m not totally
convinced I got the script. So for a change, I’m going to try to capture it even as I type.
Let’s see....
Someone called Dr. Iqbal Ansari has been charged with POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act) because a huge cache of arms and ammunitions have been discovered in his aprtment by the police who were I assume acting on a tip off. After some shoddy treatment at their hands, as is want of hardened street smart pandus in this line of work, our man is detained in Chandangarh (did I get that right?)... so far so good
If I’m with the story...for SOME reason he has to be transferred to Mumbai
Further, for SOME reason, his transfer can’t be done secretly and swiftly via aircraft etc, and has to be done via road, that too through long and unfriendly terrain
For SOME reason, every time this is attempted, the convoy is attacked, a lot of cops die, and our man remains alive and in custody
For SOME reason, these guys are not keen on taking prisioners - just getting rid of our man and/or making sure he doesnt make it to Mumbai (else they would target him in Chandan...something itself).
Yet, for SOME reason, though they seem to be immensely organised, have a formdiable supply of men and machines at their disposal etc, they can never seem to get ’rid’ of the guy. In today’s day and age, they chose not to just blow up the entire convoy, but go in braveheart style each time
For SOME reason, our favourite action stud, Angre - likes to play hide and seek, and do childish things like put a bomb in a jeep etc rather than blow the convoy into the sky
For SOME reason, he has an army of seasoned mercenaries outside a shoddy hut occupied by a few tired, outnumbered, low on ammunication mamus but he cannot seem to charge in and blow thier brains out, and then over a cup of tea torment his nemesis and also accomplish the mission he has an excuse to indulge himself in the first place.
No - he needs to wait, play it out cautiously, throw in chits asking them to surrender etc. I wonder if it was Srivastav’s booming voice that terrified him?
Hey wait, I almost forgot - I can’t remember anyone in any department - some politician, some superior perhaps, who may have lost faith in the system but is Srivastav’s mentor nonetheless. No there are none of them. If politics / crime are so organised did Angre’s mission have to be all that difficult? Let aside the fact that he could not accomplish it.
Angre reminds me - didnt he slaughter 5 guys cold bloodedly when he was young? He came out of jail impressively middle aged after whatever sentence he served for it. If he wasn’t sent to the creator, I would be tempted to conjecture that he was at least confined to ’3 deewarein’ (perhaps 4) for the rest of his miserable life. But he seemed to admit in some scene that he served his time - implicitly - because he mentinoed ’release’ and not ’escape’ or something as interesting.
Ansari definitely was fabulous. A capable doctor who has the large heartedness and insane nationalism to not only jump into something he needn’t have in the first place, but to take on teh bad guys on the phone etc, rather than do something sublte like photocopy a file - hand over the original to the bad guys or something like that. When any chick with a low neckline or high hemline looks at some crazy goon in the face and says ’main abhi thane jaa ke police ko sabh batati hoon’ a few frames before getting raped, I know where the story is going. Ansari may not have made for good titillation but he sure was headed towards a similar fate.
And after all of this he cant figure out after hours and hours of intense, life threatening moments with these handful of brave cops that they are not on the other side? And the only thing that prompts him to open his mouth is humiliation at being called a traitor crossing some threshold?
I’ve already lost the plot
There were some twists and turns and it all ended well.
Thank god for Big B. Put him in a ballet with green tights and I may be still able to watch him for hours. The entire cast was superb except for a few cops who flung their arms too violently while getting shot. I’ve not seen a man getting shot except in the movies, but somehow didnt look good.
Ditto for rapid firing when Angre’s men finally drew up the courage to resist the potential deathliness of Srivastavs booming voice and stormed the shanty he was holed up in. Seemed like Diwali was being celebrated. Again, I havent seen that kind of firing, except in movies so whom am I to judge?
And by the way, the team that shot the opening sequence - did they not shoot this one as well. The opening sequence reminded me of a lot of hollywood stuff, especially I think ’Rules of Engagement’ where a convy gets ambushed in a narrow gulley. That was mind blowing - for once it seemed hollywood quality, and ended superbly with the holes appearing in the garge door as the cop (who overacted by flailing his arms as did Shekar when facing his firigng squed) pulled down the shutter
I definitely still havent got the story. Apologies. What I did register was the power of a mind boggling combination of audio visual wizardly. There is alwasy sound in the background and its not ’tenan tenan....’ all the time - I thought it was really good and accompanied brilliantly with engaging camerawork. Maza aaaya.
All in all, enjoyed the three hours but when I see a script (contradiction here cause I didtn see a script at all) like this, I wonder why people can’t appreciate the attention to detail and tying in loose ends that scriptwriters of the league of Mr. Sudhir Mishra seem to employ.