Dhurandhar movie review: All you never wanted to know about the Lyari gang world of Karachi, now you will never ask. After 3 hours and 34 minutes of giving us a speed read of this neighbourhood – purportedly the nucleus of Pakistan’s ticking atom bomb – Aditya Dhar, the writer, director, producer, and chronicler of the new “ghus ke maarange” India, is not even done. For Dhurandhar ends with that pregnant ellipsis… ‘To be continued’.
Just as well, for Dhurandhar doesn’t really begin at the beginning either. It’s an amalgamation of all the “wrongs” done by Pakistan on India, from the Kandahar hijacking to the Parliament attack to the 26/11 Mumbai attacks, which have led India’s deeply troubled Intelligence Bureau chief Sanyal (Madhavan, as a barely disguised Ajit Doval) to devise a plan to infiltrate an agent deep inside Pakistan’s terror networks.
A loyal aide is a sole recipient of Sanyal’s many lamentations about how “Indians are Indians’ worst enemies”, how ministers are only lining own pockets, how “we have to wait for a government that thinks like us”, how R&AW officials such as a floppy-hair A S Dulat lookalike are delusional about peace, even how “Bharat Mata ki Jai” can be a rallying cry, etc etc, to make things right.
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From 1999 Kandahar, and a very bloody beheading of Rupin Katyal therein, to 2001 Parliament attack and a security woman’s last gasping breath on a stretcher, to 2008 Mumbai terror attacks and the real recording of an exchange between the terrorists and their handlers, Sanyal is at the heart of every big and small thing. So someone must be doing something right, at least by him.
Sanyal’s primacy having been established, the film spends most of its time in Karachi’s Lyari, and on India’s 007 Hamza, an undercover Indian agent played by long-maned, flowing-beard, muscle-ripped, tight-Pathan suit, light mountain eyes, and man-bun swagger by Ranveer Singh (yes, he is hardly “blending in”). He is posing as a Baloch, in a neighbourhood where they and Pathans have a bloody rivalry, and he must inveigle his way into the good books of gang leader Rehman Baloch (Khanna), who controls Lyari, for his mission.
To give credit where it is due, despite the many, many characters Dhurandhar introduces to give us a sense of Lyari’s power, crime, political and family dynamics, the plot is fairly comprehensible. Khanna taps into his hidden Michael Corleone to play a slender, sensitive, family man gangster, who gradually loses his way to ambition. Pandor is impressive as his loyal cousin and the second-in-command Uzair, and Bedi is a delight as the venal politician Jameel, who will break bread with anybody for a slice of power.
The very jarring note is Arjun, who plays the unnecessary role of Jameel’s daughter. Purportedly an aspiring doctor, she drops all that and her father’s riches to romance with Hamza, who is little more than a henchman. And even after he has used her as a bait to get to Jameel.
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Once in a while Hamza does send intelligence back to India, once in a while a dash of reality elevates this fiction, and once in a while we see the purpose of India’s “great game”. Most of the time though, Dhurandhar I is all about which of the three current and ageing hunks – Ranveer Singh as Hamza, Rampal as the ISI’s Major Iqbal, and Sanjay Dutt as Karachi police encounter specialist Choudhary Aslam – can land and stand how much blood and gore.
Karachi (or what stands for it) provides a new, interesting backdrop, the amount of references to Benazir Bhutto and her party are a good surprise, Ranveer does his thing as he does his things, it’s nice to see Khanna hitting his stride, and it’s even better to see Bedi steal the show as the oily, grovely politician who can be counted on to be the last man standing.
Dhurandhar movie director: Aditya Dhar
Dhurandhar movie cast: Ranveer Singh, Akshaye Khanna, Arjun Rampal, Sanjay Dutta, Sara Arjun, Rakesh Bedi, Madhavan, Danish Pandor
Dhurandhar movie rating: 2.5 stars
