Kaabil
Year: 2017
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Yami Gautam, Rohit Roy, Ronit Roy, Girish Kulkarni, Narendra Jha

Kaabil versus Raees. From the time it was announced that both movies would release on the same day, the ‘rumour/hype’-mill was in full swing. It was supposed to be a Hrithik versus SRK match. Now 2 weeks after the release, the box office seems to have accepted both the movies to make them enter the coveted 100 crore-club.

Raees review was already posted on the site but Kaabil remained to be seen. Now that viewing is over and it is time to post the impressions.

What’s the plot?

A young, self-reliant blind couple meets up over a planned matchmaking session.  The guy is a talented voiceover artist (Hrithik Roshan) and the girl (Yami Gautam) is an NGO worker with a flair for piano. The sparks fly, the romance lights up and a marriage follows. The newfound happiness is cut short when two ruffians rape the girl. One of the perpetrators is an influential local corporator’s (Ronit Roy) brother (Rohit Roy) and the corrupt cops (Girish Kulkarni, Narendra Jha) make sure that the wronged couple won’t get any justice. When there is one misstep too many to tolerate, the blind man decides to take law into his own hands. How will he overcome his physical handicap in his revenge mission?

What’s hot?

·       Hrithik and Yami make a handsome pair.

·       The second half where the blind man plots and executes his acts of vengeance is interesting.

·       Slick production values.

What’s not?

·       Sanjay Gupta once again dishes out his typical brand of broad-brushed crime-flicks based on foreign films. Some reviews have thrown names such as Blind Fury (a 1989 Hollywood thriller) and Broken (a 2014 Korean film) as the inspirations.

·       In such films we already know what would happen in the end; it is how it happens is what makes them interesting. The writer and the director fail to bring that fresh, intelligent narrative, which gives zip to such thrillers.

·       Only in the action-packed second half, Hrithik gets his bearing right. His first half performance suffers from a strong Koi Mil Gaya- hangover. Come on man, the character is visually challenged- not mentally!

·       The Greek God of Bollywood has started showing his age, too! What a pity; we all thought his looks were timeless!

·       Yami Gautam more or less plays a decorative piece without much to do.

·       The villains and their cronies are portrayed in a stereotyped manner. Giving the Roy-brothers Marathi characters is a disaster.

·       The plot devices are rather tiresome and none too plausible.

·       Rajesh Roshan’s music is a pale shadow of his heyday repertoire.

Verdict

Kaabil is a rather unimaginative vengeance saga, which is mostly clichéd and cloying but is watchable in parts. Its box office run, (and the surprisingly positive reviews in leading publications!) may have given a fillip to Hrithik’s faltering career but rather than feeling secure in this success, the star hunk will be better served if he gets rid of his all too predictable mannerisms to reinvent himself in future fares.

Rating

2 stars