Vinod Khanna was once considered as a top star in Hindi cinema. Infact, he was the media's blue-eyed man against the superstar Bachchan in late 70's. A shocking decision by Khanna to leave the filmdom and join Osho's ashram left the dream unfulfilled. However, after a 5-6 year gap when Khanna made a comeback with 2 back to back hits Insaaf and Satyamev Jayate, both released in 1987 he did prove his point. Following, these 2 movies came this movie with his friend Feroz Khan. Despite not being a hit for me Davayan has Vinod Khanaa in his best ever performance alongwith Gulzars Achanak and Raj Khosla's Mera Gaon Mera Desh and is brilliantly directed by Feroz Khan.
After making crime thrillers like Apradh ,Dharmatama and the biggest of them all Qurbaani, Feroz hit a slight low patch as Jaanbaaz despite having an excellent music track failed to match the success of his earlier movies. In order to recreate the magic Feroz made the most intense movie of his carrier-Dayavan. The movie was a remake of Tamil classic Nayakan directed by Mani Rathnam and had Kamal Hassan in the lead. Though its impossible to match Mani Ratnam and Kamal Hassan of Nayakan , I must say that Feroz Khan made a great remake of a classic movie. It is very difficult to make a good remake of a good movie and Khan deserves full credit for handling a subject which was so different from his style of cinema.
However, the highlight of the movie is Vinod Khanna. Kamal Hassan's Nayakan act CANNOT be matched BUT I must say that Vinod lived the role of Shakti to perfection and gave one of the best performances of a man caught in the web of crime. His diction, accent and typical Tamilian behaviour and look deserves a pat on the back of both Vinod himself and Feroz Khan.
Despite the fact that the film didn't do well and lot of critics didn't like it as the original masterpiece NAYAKAN was so fresh, I still feel Dayavan was very well remade and enacted!
