In one
excruciatingly long scene of R Rajkumar,
Sonu Sood sits with a bunch of his gunda cronies and jovially sings ‘I am your
Bull. You are my shit. Together we are Bullshit’.
Never before in the
history of Hindi cinema has a film so astutely relayed its intentions from the
makers of the film to the viewers. Which is why I need to emulate a song from R Rajkumar to elucidate its overall
quality: Gandi film, Gandi gandi gandi
gandi gandi film.
Directed by
Prabhudheva, R Rajkumar secures the
honor of justifying the fact that Bollywood can be full of surprises – just
when you think you’ve seen the most annoying film of the year, up pops an even
more mind shreddingly irritating one. This movie also earns the prestigious
honor of being the only mainstream film of the year that I’ve walked out of
(and I’ve sat through Grown Ups 2).
Every limitation of
any movie can be forgiven if it makes you laugh. R Rajkumar has only one such moment, when you realize that
Bollywood is attempting to make money by trying to make 90’s Telugu movies. At
all other times the film is a thoroughly laugh-free, idiotic, juvenile,
maddening, moronic, outdated gulag of guano that galls and irritates with every
passing second of its interminable stream of pig swill pretending to be humor.
The movie was originally called Rambo Rajkumar, and I believe Stallone enforced
a ban on the name not because of copyright infringement but because he didn't
want Rambo to be associated with something so knowingly wretched.
Here's what
happened - a couple of years ago when Rowdy
Rathore hit 100 crores a producer realized 'Holy crap! What a magician
Prabhudheva is! Someone get him to make another Simbly South style film, hire a
fledgling actor and get it done asap! We have a December weekend to exploit!'
This theory explains why the plot of the R
Rajkumar is reminiscent of 80's Bollywood and 90's Telugu cinema, and
that's a huge slap in the face to film buffs. Here's all you need to know about
the story - hero joins villain's gang as henchman, both hero and villain like
the same girl, hero will do anything to save the girl. That's it. And that was
the plot of Once Upon a Time in Mumbai
Dobara as well, and the girl in that movie was also Sonakshi Sinha.
The trio of actors
involved are: Shahid Kapoor, who we know has better cinema sensibility than
this (hint: Kaminey), Sonakshi Sinha
who looks like she is extremely grateful for any acting gig that she can get,
and Sonu Sood who is both completely devoid of comedic talent and utterly
uninterested in anything happening on the set. The love-lust triangle between
the three is crass and asinine and utterly unbecoming of a film releasing in
2013. You can't even credit Prabhudheva for trying to evoke ancient mysoginist
desi B-cinema because instead of parodying the genre he actually takes it
seriously. After two hours of this junk you feel like leaping into the screen
and do to the filmmaker what Lisbeth Salander did to her lawyer.
The saddest part of
all this is Asrani, who at his age and experience, is handed cringe inducing
pathetic lines, and made to tear his clothes and stand in his undies for
'comedy'. His performance here is the absolute zenith of career humiliation,
and is used to complement the donkey carnival show of shameless, unfunny and
obsolete skits on 'massy hero vs villain'.
You also get choice lines like 'mere mooh mat lagna, mai sehed ke liye
haanikaarak hoon', along with a barrage of 'comedic' sound cues. If this is
what you want to see in a movie, call me. I have a couch at home. We'll talk
about your life, your priorities, your cerebral harmony and what is best for
you as a modern civilized human being. I can help. I promise.
(First published in Firstpost)
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