Akshay Kumar is here to save us. From What ? Where? How? These questions are redundant. The saviour complex must have an outlet, and so we sit through this extravaganza, where Sooryavanshi – one man army/ police/ justice provider/ desh ka sole protector - must be allowed to save us. The threat, as usual, is from padosi desh Pakistan.
In the first 10 minutes of Rohit Shetty's Sooryavanshi, lots of names are dropped and elaborate plans spelt out. However, it’s very tough to keep track of this PPT presentation. It’s much easier to surrender instead to the 'Us vs Them' narrative that’s being peddled.
We jump from 1993 to 2007 to the present day. Words like RDX, Lashkar sleeper cells, bomb blasts are casually thrown around. Finally what sticks is that 600kg RDX needs to be urgently tracked down. This line is repeated multiple times and with multiple levels of urgency so that we never forget.
Since subtlety isn’t Rohit Shetty’s strong suit, the screenplay replays relevant scenes twice, as if the makers never trusted us with keeping track of things in the first place. Add to that the audio logo 'Sooryavanshi' that is sprung at us every few minutes, courtesy a jarring background score.
'Sooryavanshi' is designed to let our hero in uniform take centre stage. Characters exist solely for the purpose of allowing Kumar to be his swashbuckling best, and who doesn’t enjoy this kind of attention?
Slo-mo shots of our hero with his daredevilry are on full display. This is very much expected, but what is truly comic and baffling is how no one else is extended the courtesy of showcasing even a tiny bit of swagger. Such is the urgency to let no one upstage Akshay even for a second that we have fully able men with bulging muscles who stand by as statues, letting only one man do the heavy-lifting.
Nikitan Dheer, Abhimanyu Singh, Vivan Bhathena all careful not to challenge the status quo. There is a scene where a fellow officer, who has a gun, passes it to Akshay so that he can take aim in slow motion and kill desh ke dushman. Later, someone’s fist hangs mid-air and he remains put so that our cops without capes can win the bout.
Yes, this testosterone driven cop-verse has not just Surya but Singham (Ajay Devgn) and Simmba ( Ranveer Singh), who also partake of the goodies. Only that they enter well after the interval, by which time we have been so disoriented by the loud background score and slow narrative that it's hard to care about them. We surely take notice as they march in with their specific audio logos being played out vociferously. Sadly, a grand entry moment cannot save the deliberately-crafted lulls. Of course, we are mentally prepared to suspend disbelief and not expect a nuanced story with logic, but even the action sequences wear a stale, lazy look. A helicopter is brought in, cars blow up as is the template, cylinders burst, chase sequences take place on water and through fire, but all that has been done and dusted.
The awkward jumps between Akshay as the brave single-minded cop and husband to Riya (Katrina Kaif) and father to a son named Aryan make things all the more cluttered.
Akshay and Katrina’s love story progresses at breakneck speed in the course of a single song . We have a dance sequence wherein the much-in-love couple idle away while being surrounded by four colourful vintage cars parked in a way to create a safe space for their shenanigans. This is peace time in the Shetty scheme of things because cars will soon fly and collide with each other as we inch towards the denouement.
The desh ke dushman theme is painstakingly interwoven with the 'Good Muslim-Bad Muslim' philosophy that Sooryavanshi vehemently endorses. “iss desh mein jitni nafrat Kasab ke liye hai, utna pyaar Kalam ke liye”. The song 'Hum Hindustani' playing in the background is a little on-the-nose. Muslims and Hindus come together to avert a terror strike. However, why should the onus to prove their virtue and loyalty only rest with one community is never answered by the film.
Watching a movie in the theatre is pure joy for film aficionados. How wonderful it would have been if Sooryavanshi lived up to its hype.
Our rating: 2.5 Quints out of 5.
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