The Paradox Of Dhurandhar

So, I've finally watched Dhurandhar. Let's review it.

This movie is still leading it's 1000 crore+ run in the box office, the media, the Bollywood industry and the average moviegoer crowd. But there are things that need to be talked about because when the crowd finds a good, theatre-worthy movie - a lot of aspects are overseen.

I'll start by saying that this is a great movie, with a lot of effort put into it - be it the music, writing, CGI & VFX, acting. Every actor played their part to the fullest and did justice to the role. It's even harder considering the movie tries to base itself on sources to convey a true story through theatrical effects - and it does work out really well. The movie invigorates a feeling of injustice, agony, helplessness and rage among every Indian. 

After all, Patriotism is its own genre in Indian Cinema.

But that also seemed to be the biggest problem for me in this movie. The movie did fall flat in particular areas in terms of pacing and being cohesive, though it's cleanly intended to be a two-part movie - it does feel as if the movie spends a lot of time creating a sense of growing rage, restlessness and anticipation rather than continuing the story. Aditya Dhar, the director - is known mainly for his previous work which was also patriotic - URI. But when this movie released, it was able to create this feeling so well, that it blinded the viewer to certain nuances and plot-points that just seem to fall flat and victim to poor pacing - it isn't even nitpicking, but in 2020s I've come to see movies that have an overall better cohesive landing. After all, no movie is perfect. You either make a truly great movie or a greatly true movie.

Dhurandhar comes the closest to trying to reach both ends of the spectrum. But it puts you in a deadlock - if you criticise any aspect of this movie, you may be termed as an anti-nationalist. As a writer, it does hurt because Indian Cinema is where Patriotism could hinder the perception of cinematic writing. People fell even further into the positive sunken cost fallacy quite a bit - certain posts pointing out about how the movie caters really well to feminists and stays "clean" - knowing the swears used in this movie, I'll let you be the judge of that.

You're allowed to think whatever you think of this movie - your time, your thoughts, your eyes, your perception.

But Ankit, he's based this movie on true events. It's harder to write keeping those heavy aspects and liabilities of truth in mind!

I do agree. It's harder to write something based on true events and still keep it cinematic. But the director is known for keeping loose ends with the source material to go all in for a cinematic delivery. The issue is elsewhere, and it's the issue of trying to balance time constraints, cohesive story, continuity of source material and story delivery. We see very less of what Dhurandhar is in today's time. But because this concept lacks ubiquity, we'll never know if this was truly the best execution for it.

Also, this movie draws certain concepts really heavily from Phantom and The Night Manager. Be it working the undercover job at the specific place, the way the spy gains the bigger party's trust, and how the revenge is taken with a sudden nefarious intent. The movie is great, and imperfect like every other movie, just that the imperfections are less likely to be noticed by the average viewer due to the nature of the movie. 

Good luck or good marketing. You can decide that.