By - Amit kumaR Agarwal
War 2 was trashed by most of the critics - is the film really that bad?
To be honest, the film is average; and definitely not, Thugs of Hindostan, it is made out to be!
The writing is bad, the editing is bad, the action mixed - and that makes the film look bad.
Without going into the details of the technicalities - the core Indian audiences still want a face for the villain - they don't rely on AI's and technical gizmo and what have you and this is the biggest undoing of War 2.
I mean 90% audiences won't identify the names like KC Shankar and Varun Badola. Will you?
Let's first take stock of the ups for the film
- Performances by Hrithik Roshan, NTR, Kiara Advani and Ashutosh Rana
- Perfect bod-figures of Hrithik Roshan and Kiara Advani (she is really going to give many girls a strong fitness regimen to get that perfect bikini-bod)
- Two action sequences - The car sequence matching the sequence in Mission Impossible franchise (dollar for rupee). Really breathtaking
- Aawaan Jawaan and Janaabe-Aali song
- Locations and the scale
The downers are many compared to the ups
- Dialogues
- Background Music
- Screenplay
- Action on Hrithik Roshan's entry - what could have been highlight of the movie, is marred by a lame action sequence
- Action on NTR's entry - again marred by shoddy angles and equally shoddy editing and BGM
- Length of the film, could have easily been trimmed by 30 minutes
Frankly, a larger than life movie has to highlight the heroism of the hero, grossly lacking in War 2. For example:
- Kabir's (Hrithik Roshan) entry into the Kali gang; instead of killing Col. Luthra, he should have saved him and the screenplay ought to be novel about the way Kabir is initiated into the Kali gang.
- Again, NTR saves the character of Gulati from being killed by Kabir and then kills Gulati, saying he wanted Kabir framed for the killing. Wouldn't he allow Kabir to kill Gulati and then open the cards to Kabir?
There are many such glaring glitches in the screenplay.
This screenplay of convenience is rendered spineless thanks to very poor dialogues. The timing of NTR's dialogues is totally out because of evident struggle with Hindi, YRF should have got the dialogues dubbed.
Frankly, a simpler screenplay with NTR against the law and Hrithik chasing him would have worked much better. Why would NTR be concerned about saving the lives of train-passengers. It is this confusion in writing that doesn't let audiences invest in either of the characters of Hrithik Roshan or NTR.
Many scenes go on and on. The childhood track didn't need a song at all.
These are only few of the things that make War 2 a below-average film.
YRF will see it in the collections as well, post the above-average weekend collections; from Monday, August 18 onwards, War 2 will find the going really, very, very, very, tough!