REVIEW 725: SAAHO

Release date:	August 30, 2019
Director:	Sujeeth
Cast: Language:	Prabhas, Shraddha Kapoor, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Mandira Bedi, Prakash Belawadi, Arun Vijay, Chunky Panday, Mahesh Manjrekar, Lal, Tinnu Anand, Jackie Shroff, Vennela Kishore, Murali Sharma Saaho was simultaneously shot in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi. This is a review of the Hindi version.

Prabhas is a pretty boy and a giant of a man, the sort of hunk with a face so innocent that he looks like he does not realise quite how hot he is or the effect he has on our hormones as we watch him, a face also pleading not guilty to violence committed by his body against bad guys in films.

There are few things more attractive in this world than a person who is not overly aware of their beauty. This charming aspect of Prabhas’ personality is diluted though in a film obsessed with its leading man’s many positive physical attributes. And so we get Prabhas captured in a long shot as an imposing solitary figure leaning languidly against a car, Prabhas standing Batman-like atop a skyscraper looking out on the world, Prabhas shot from a low angle stretching his arms out as he is framed against snow-covered mountains, Prabhas’ monumental muscles on display as he bathes, Prabhas’ face in close up, Prabhas’ face in extreme close-up – any closer and the camera would have pierced him.

To be fair to cinematographer Madhie, this would have been the brief. Saaho is, after all, a film defined by visual over-statement. In leading lady Shraddha Kapoor’s introductory scene, we get an extreme extreme close-up of one of her eyes. And she too is treated more like a mannequin than a human being by the camera throughout.

This, in totality, is what writer-director Sujeeth’s Saaho is: an over-indulgent, over-stylised film in which looks have been prioritised over substance, swagger over script.

The plot, for what it is worth, is about internecine rivalry in a business empire that one man describes as the “world’s most powerful crime syndicate”. When the chief of the Roy Group (Jackie Shroff) is killed, the battle for his position is fought between a whole troop of characters played by Mandira Bedi, Arun Vijay, Chunky Panday, Mahesh Manjrekar, Lal and Tinnu Anand. As they scramble across the world in search of a black box that is the key to godknowswhat, a troop of others including the police are hot on their heels. Among those in pursuit are characters played by Prabhas, Shraddha Kapoor, Neil Nitin Mukesh, Vennela Kishore, Murali Sharma and Prakash Belawadi.

Please don’t ask me who is who, who is aligned with who, or what specific purpose that black box was meant to serve. I lost interest somewhere in the first half when it became clear that this uninspired script packed with a multitude of uninteresting twists was just an excuse to flash highfalutin gadgets, SFX, stunts and Prabhas at us.

The writing recycles a zillion tropes from a zillion ‘mass entertainers’ of the sort that continue to find favour with male megastars across Indian film industries from Prabhas to Rajinikanth, Salman Khan to Mammootty and Vijay.

Among Saaho’s library of clichés is the heroine who is given a serious job and then trivialised by the hero, her real purpose in the project being to fall in love with him, be loved by him, look glamorous and feature in a couple of song ‘n’ dance routines. Shraddha Kapoor’s cop Amritha Nair even gets to fall on the floor on her back in a shootout while Prabhas’ Ashok falls on top of her, they gaze at each other, breathe heavily and simultaneously deal with the life-and-death situation around them. Gawd! Done to death in commercial cinema across the world! Can we retire it forever? Puhleeease?

More clichés, these ones peculiar to the Indian cinemascape. Amritha sheds her smart work attire to slip into a teeny weeny shimmery outfit for a nightclub song – she is undercover, of course. And then there is that long romantic number for which she wears flowy dresses and poses around in grand natural locations while he poses around with her. The only such number I remember liking in recent years is Gerua from the Hindi film Dilwale (2015) because, the formula notwithstanding, that song was to die for and the SRK-Kajol chemistry is worth dying and being resurrected for. The music of Saaho, on the other hand, is insipid. And Prabhas and Kapoor have zero sparks between them. They are, in fact, so cold together, that when they first declare their love for each other, I burst out laughing.

The two also share a kiss at one point that would put an iceberg to shame.

As bland as their pairing is the acting of the entire cast. Mandira Bedi is the only one who gets to break from the rest when she overacts till kingdom come on discovering the film’s final big reveal.

The problem is not that that secret in the end can be seen coming from a mile. The problem is that it is, by then, just impossible to care.

Prabhas is one of Telugu cinema’s biggest stars. He is known nationwide for playing the title character in Baahubali: The Beginning and Baahubali: The Conclusion, the Tollywood ventures (released in several languages) that rank among India’s top 5 all-time greatest box-office hits. Saaho is his pitch to make a post-Baahubali all-India splash again. The film was shot simultaneously in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi. Malayalam and Kannada dubbed versions have also been released. Whatever the Baahubali films’ flaws may have been, the first one was pathbreaking in its use of technology in the Indian scenario and neither of the two can be accused of being run-of-the-mill. With the world now at his feet, I cannot imagine why Prabhas signed up for a film as generic and dull as Saaho.

The only film more boring than this that I have seen this year is the Malayalam disaster Mikhael starring Nivin Pauly. Saaho and Mikhael make last year’s Hindi film Race 3 look shiny and innovative in comparison.

In the unending hours between the beginning and the end of Saaho, across locations in India and abroad, villains say stupid things in low voices, Prabhas’ character does things that we are told are impressive, there are fights and chases, bodies are battered, men in winged armoured suits fly through the air, mobikes zip down expressways and cars explode. A lot of it is very high tech and clearly very expensive. At the end of the day though, what we get is not a film but a little boy showing off his toys to his playmates.

Rating (out of five stars): *

CBFC Rating (India):	UA
Running time:	171 minutes

A version of this review has also been published on Firstpost:

https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/saaho-movie-review-prabhas-picks-a-generic-masala-mix-to-make-a-post-baahubali-all-india-splash-yawn-7254931.html

Visuals courtesy: https://www.facebook.com/SaahoTheMovie/

REVIEW 562: VODKA DIARIES

Release date:	January 19, 2018
Director:	Kushal Srivastava
Cast: Language:	Kay Kay Menon, Mandira Bedi, Raima Sen, Sharib Hashmi Hindi

Vodka is an intoxicant, but expect the opposite effect from director Kushal Srivastava’s Vodka Diaries now in theatres. The title is drawn from a nightclub in Manali linked to a series of murders that ACP Ashwini Dixit (Kay Kay Menon) sets out to solve in the film. Subsequent scenes reveal that those crimes may well have occurred only in Dixit’s imagination, as character after character that he had seen dead resurfaces around him, healthy and whole. Either that, or someone is playing a nasty trick on him or orchestrating a cover-up. Take your pick.

When these mind games begin, Dixit is already traumatised by a recurring nightmare. He fights hard not to succumb to his confusion and fears, even as his wife Shikha, a poet played by Mandira Bedi, tries to soothe his nerves when that bad dream occurs. To some extent their banter does calm him down.

In addition to the lead couple and the murder ‘victims’, there are two important players in this story: a mystery woman played by Raima Sen who is shadowing Dixit, and a subordinate cop (Sharib Hashmi) who is a master of pathetic puns and jokes.

Vodka Diaries’ basic concept may have been developed better by a better writer, but as things stand, when the big reveal comes, Raima Sen’s character’s secret is so silly that the aspect of the plot which had potential – why Dixit sees what he sees or thinks he does – ceases to matter.

Menon, who has been truly special in some films, usually needs a solid director to keep him in check. In the absence of controls in Vodka Diaries, he overdoes things to such an extent that he gives the impression that he is mocking himself, his character and the film.

Hashmi, who was so loveable in 2014’s unheralded Filmistaan, and Bedi are more invested in their half-baked roles. Sen, on the other hand, with not a hair or a dot of makeup out of place, looks pretty, bored and disinterested.

DoP Maneesh ChandraBhatt delivers some eye-catching shots of picturesque Manali, and along with the production design team manages to build up an ominous atmosphere in the early part of the narrative. However, the look of the film recedes into the background as the effect of the inert direction sets in and the overt effort to manipulate the audience gets tedious.

The casting director too must be called to account. The artistes playing the murder ‘victims’ are so indistinctive that, frankly, I could not bring myself to care whether they were alive or dead.

If the writing department had shown as much devotion to Vodka Diaries as Raima Sen’s styling team did, perhaps something could have come of it. The mystery here is not who the killer is, who died or whether someone died at all. The mystery is who the hell greenlit this undercooked script, deeming it worthy of being made into a film.

Rating (out of five stars): 1/2

CBFC Rating (India):	UA
Running time:	118 minutes

Poster courtesy: https://www.facebook.com/vodkadiariesthefilm/