Story:
In case you haven’t watched Singham Again’s trailer (which tells you exactly what the film is about), let us do the needful. When Bajirao Singham (Ajay Devgn) arrests wanted Pakistani terrorist leader Omar Hafeez (Jackie Shroff) – who you might remember from Sooryavanshi (2021), in broad daylight, Zubair Hafeez aka Danger Lanka (Arjun Kapoor) plans to free his grandfather and take revenge for the killings of his family members by abducting Singham’s wife Avani (Kareena Kapoor Khan). Avani works with the Ministry of Culture and is occupied with a stage enactment of the Ramayana (or Ramleela as it’s popularly known) when she’s abducted and taken to Sri Lanka.
Singham then assembles his avengers (or the Shiva Squad) to fight the evil and bring Avani back with the help of Sooryavanshi (Akshay Kumar), Simmba (Ranveer Singh), Lady Singham (Deepika Padukone), Satya (Tiger Shroff) and then some – this forms the crux of the film. By drawing parallels to the story of Sita’s abduction by Raavan and the subsequent battle between him and Lord Ram, Singham Again attempts to bring forth a modern-day retelling of the age-old trope of ‘Good triumphs over all evil’.
Review:
Producer and director Rohit Shetty had a mammoth ambition for Singham Again – to bring the biggest of stars together in his Cop Universe’s tentpole action-hero franchise film. Of course, when there are so many stars making special appearances in the same feature film, each one has to be given a dhamakedaar entry to avoid doing any disservice to any of their fans. Even if it means defying all logic and sense of reasoning. But one rarely enters the theatres to watch a Rohit Shetty film and takes their brain along, especially in the last 10 years. In trying to do justice to each of the star appearances, and linking it to the characters of the Ramayana, the screenplay goes completely haywire. Don’t get us wrong, it seemed like an intelligent move on paper. After all, where else would you find a ready-to-use template that has so many interesting characters, other than our own epics?
The film’s story is wafer-thin and it seems that barely any effort has been taken to etch out its screenplay. Credited to six writers (including Shetty) Singham Again becomes a classic case of too many cooks spoiling the broth. However, some meta references in the dialogues, especially by Ranveer’s Simmba in the second half, somewhat try to save the day. Rather than spending so much time trying to get the dates of some of the biggest actors together (as is referenced in the film as well), it would’ve made more sense to pay more attention to the script. There’s absolutely no originality in the way things are executed in the film. You’re barely five minutes into the movie and there are cars crashing and turning upside down (in case you forgot it’s a Rohit Shetty film). After some point, the screenplay just becomes one slow-motion entry after another and continues to be so till just before the end credits roll.
When one goes to watch a Rohit Shetty film one knows that if nothing, there will be some jaw-dropping action sequences with some clever one-liners to add humour. The same is attempted in Singham Again too. However, the action set pieces give a major sense of been-there-seen-that. At this point, we don’t even know when Rohit Shetty’s action choreography stopped being exciting. Sample a sequence in the climax where a car makes a complete parabola, over a helicopter. Gravity, physics, and all rationale completely go for a toss in the action set pieces. A missile gets blown behind Singham and Avani without causing any damage to even a strand of their hair. Even the terrible Prime Video series Indian Police Force (also helmed by Rohit Shetty) had better action choreography with hand-held cameras and some well-executed hand-to-hand combat sequences.
Ajay Devgn, reprising his character of Bajirao Singham after about 14 years, comes with a lot of swagger, especially in his multiple slo-mo entry shots, but pales when it comes to the signature ferociousness and anger that Singham became synonymous with back in 2011. Here, we see a more calm and subdued Singham, which may be attributed to his character that has aged more like a legend and icon, revered by the current crop of officers in the police force. For a movie that’s titled after his character, there’s very little that he gets to do. The aggression of his character gets lost in service of the numerous special appearances that abound in the film. However, in a couple of scenes where he gets some seeti-maar dialogues, he gives us all a glimpse of the Singham we’re familiar with. The absence of his OG and iconic theme music is also felt deeply.
Arjun Kapoor completely steals the show as the formidable antagonist Zubair – a modern-day embodiment of the essence of Raavan’s evil. He seems to have understood the tonality of his character pretty well and has put up a commendable act on screen. From his ama-wait-for-it-zing entry sequence to his confident and immensely impressive close-up shots – he has nailed every single note of his character and how! The only disappointment was the underwhelming face-off between him and Singham that begins well with hand-to-hand action but leaves us wanting for more. But that is more the fault of the screenplay, rather than the actor. Arjun seems to be having fun and enjoying being the baddie and it shows!
Ranveer Singh is in his element as Sangram Bhalerao aka Simmba and is a joy to watch on screen. He brings the much-needed comic relief to an otherwise dull screenplay. However, he does take some time to get into the groove of his character. But once he does, especially after entering Zubair’s territory, he is on fire what with delivering one cackling line after another. His impeccable comic timing hits the right notes and helps uplift your mood as well. He gets a few dialogues with real-life meta references that will surely bring a smile to your face. His camaraderie with every actor he shares the screen space, is simply superb!
Deepika Padukone as Shakti Shetty aka Lady Singham misses the mark and doesn’t quite live up to the hype. As was evident in the trailer itself, her dialogue delivery appeared quite one-tone – a poor rendition of her Chennai Express (2013) act if you will. There was so much scope with the addition of her character in the Cop Universe but it remained underutilised – both in terms of the way her character arc was written as well as executed. Probably a spin-off of Lady Singham with a solid backstory would do the trick if her character is to be seen again in this cop universe. Kareena Kapoor Khan as Avani has little to do, other than be the damsel in distress.
Tiger Shroff as Satya Bali gets the most illogical entry point in the narrative. However, once you get past that, he surely does what he does best – jumps, flies and kicks with his long legs, jumps again, and oh! This time, he also displays some amazing Mixed Martial Arts stunts blended with Kalaripayattu. He doesn’t get a lot of dialogues, which, we think, works in his favour. Akshay Kumar in his small but effective cameo as Veer Sooryavanshi does the job quite effortlessly, while Ravi Kishan tries to do the best that he can in the limited scope of his character.
Last, but not the least, the film’s blaring background music does little to uplift the scenes. It seems to have been dialled up by several notches as a way to make up for the lack of solid writing in a script that is devoid of real emotions, drama, and any originality in terms of ideas. Shoddy editing and poor CGI further make you cringe even more. In the climax, you can even spot dummies at places. Phrases like “Yeh naya Bharat hai”, “Ghar mein ghus ke marta hai”, and “Aatmanirbhar Bharat” have already become too repetitive and redundant. The less we speak about the atrocious cameo by Salman Khan’s Chulbul Pandey in the end, the better it will be. It seems completely out of place and ill-thought-of. The film could’ve done without it. Well, even we could’ve done without the film.
Verdict:
Even though the makers of Singham Again try too hard to please the fans of all the actors in the film, they have fallen short of delivering the same. There’s too much fluff and hollow style over any real substance. The film set out to be an action-packed masala pot-boiler. However, all the masalas were left undercooked in this Rohit Shetty actioner.
Singham Again
Watch in: Theatres
Director: Rohit Shetty
Writers: Kshitij Patwardhan,Abhijeet Khuman, Anusha Nandakumar, Yunus Sajawal,Sandeep Saket, Rohit Shetty
Dialogues: Shantanu Srivastava, Vidhi Ghodgaonkar, Milap Zaveri
Cast: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Arjun Kapoor, Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Jackie Shroff, Ravi Kishan, Shweta Tiwari, Dayanand Shetty
