At the outset, it is important to clarify that I am a quintessential over-the-top Bollywood Masala entertainment fan. More so, an SRK fan who has previously tried to find positives in movies like Dilwale, Jab Harry Met Sejal and Fan too. But at the same time, we also need to call spade, a spade.
Jawan is a movie which stands by what it sold from the very beginning — the SRK Charm. It is a 2 hour 50 minutes of Shah Rukh Khan charisma that gets delivered in every second of the movie. It definitely is a cinematic experience with Anirudh’s background music being the second lead. But apart from SRK’s godly, almost superhuman acts such as making an entrance from the top of a mountain with the backdrop of thunder and lightning, the film unfortunately lacks depth.
The first half builds up brilliantly into an SRK universe where you are invested in the story with multiple twists (especially the pre-Interval sequence). And much like the Atlee school of cinema, the movie builds on top of a lot of social issues. But the problem is — there are a lot of social issues. From farmer suicides to poor children being asphyxiated, from an honest collector being killed mercilessly to a pregnant woman being sentenced to death, topped up with weapon mafia, corruption, women empowerment — these are just some of the issues that movie tries to touch upon.
In fact, in a very slight leaning, the movie also tries to include a social commentary about prison management and how prisons should be transformative and not punishing, in nature.
However, in all of these things that movie tries to touch and go, you find yourself caring less and less for the characters involved. After all, I need to know these characters to be able to connect with them and feel bad for them.
These issues are sensitive and run so deep that handling them even in an entire feature film exclusively can be a task. Here, Atlee tries to simply brush through them in the most superficial manner — everything just ending up showing more and more of the SRK charm (which I am not complaining about).
Shah Rukh Khan truly leaves a mark in both his roles as Vikram Rathore and Azad. But apart from SRK, the rest of the entire cast seems to be either misplaced or under-utilised. Actors of the calibre of Vijay Sethupathy, Nayanthara, Deepika Padukone, Sanya Malhotra, Priyamani and even the supporting star cast with capable actors like Ridhi Dogra, Sunil Grover, Ajaz Khan are made to feel extremely unwanted or merely filling the gaps.
The six girls who form the mighty and godly SRK’s team are totally unexplored. During the build up, one is forced to believe that this will turn out to be a brilliant, modern take as a parallel to Durga with SRK’s almost-mythological entry ending in a Kaali pose. With six girls and their individually strong background stories, this could become a unique story about common people in a fight against the system. With Vijay Sethupathy’s character and the whole weapon industry mafia, what it actually became was one man’s revenge against an ineffective villain.
I cannot miss to mention the totally useless integration of a masked Russian mafia who has a Cheetah for a pet, which completely fails to instil any fear — again, because I was not invested into that story enough either.
So you often ask yourself — if Priyamani’s character in the movie is dying, why are you not crying? Because there is no depth to the character, no time spent on building that up and it is immediately marked by filling the character’s space with another. For the same reason, Shah Rukh Khan’s supposedly impactful monologue on corruption and voting for the right candidate is seemingly unmoving, and fails to give any goosebumps — again, because everything leading up to this was a mechanical movement towards one man’s charm and over-the-top charisma.
There is no real sentiment
Nevertheless, coming back to my original point - you were sold an SRK entertainer and you get an SRK entertainer. Jawan has its grand moments, brilliant action sequences, and puts forward amazing ideas that could become individual movies in themselves. The movie still gives you value for money with the theatrical extravaganza, pre-Interval sequence, the father —SRK character’s sheer brilliance and swag, and a power-packed background music (special mention to Raja Kumari, whose song is surely another hero of the film). All these folding into SRK asking you to elect leaders carefully and ask them the right questions.
You just wish these ideas held more value in the storyline and had some emotional depth, without being just decorative pieces for the movie to fold into a lacklustre climax.
(Edited by : C H Unnikrishnan)
First Published: Sept 8, 2023 4:28 PM IST
