BADLAPUR - The movie starts with a African quote , 'THE AXE FORGET , BUT THE TREE NEVER' .
This quote almost describes the main theme of the movie. Its the Tree(Raghu played by Varun) who wants to take revenge from the Axe(Laik play by Siddique). But its not a typical revenge drama in which we have a perfect hero without any sins inside him , neither the villain is a total sinful person. Rather the characters are of Grey nature and have both goods and bads inside them. It almost feels like it has been made by Anurag Kashyap , it also have the typical awkward comic situations like of which we have seen in Gangs Of Wassypur , and its good to see that their exist another director (Sriram) who can make movies like Kashyap. But one thing that lacks in this film as compared to Kashyap's film is that the shocking element. Kashyap always keep some twists in the film to shock us which was absent in the film. In an interview Varun have said that this film will raise some debates , and i agree with that. Normally Bollywood movies show that there is a villain , who kills any person from Hero's family and our Hero take his revenge , its for his inner peace as well as for justice to some extent. But the real question is that , is revenge is a right solution to compensate the murder of your loved ones. Is killing back the murderer will give you peace , i don't think so , and the same thing has been proved by the climax which is too much unconventional as it shows the revenge didn't do anything good to our hero as he too is a sinful person and has done his part of sins for the sake of revenge . Also the villain shows the white side of his character shockingly. Which may not be liked by everyone. The film also ask a question that whether its needed to give a person who has done a tragic sin a second chance .
As i said the movie lacks the shocking element , because of that some scenes felt flat as our hero doesn't seems like he has a particular plan and is only doing random things. Also the revenge drama only starts in the 2nd half so in the first half the movie actually doesn't move much in the first half. Varun Dhawan has got a lot of complaints that he cant do different roles other that comic character as he is perfect for comedy. This will prove all those persons wrong (i am also one of them). Its not like he has nail it totally but for an actor just three film old (all the three films being too light on nature) he has done a pretty good job. And he will only get better from here. Now he is a threat for his generation of actors. To write about Siddique is being difficult now a days. He shows so much perfection to his character that leave no words to describe it. For me its actually too difficult for a hero to shine in a film in which Siddique plays a villain. Siddique has stolen the lime light from Salmaan in kick and now he has stolen all the praise from Varun(Luckily in Kahani & Talaash Siddique doesn't have a too much important role otherwise he should have stolen it from Vidya and Aamir too) . And his next will be with Srk in RAEES , be aware Shahrukh. Among female leads i would appreciate Radhika Apte who has done a good job specially in the scene where he has to create voices to show fake sex. Songs doesn't interrupt the movie at all as they appeared in background. Editing could have been better as i think revenge dramas if not directed by Kashyap like Gangs of Wassypur should not be more then 2hrs , and it is 20min long. I so much wanted this movie to be directed by Anurag Kashyap , he could have made this better. Never the less movie is dark , and by dark i mean too dark , there are dark cinematography , dark humor , strong sexual scenes(for which the movie has been given A certificate so family audience should stay away from it). Not for every type of audience , couldn't recommend it to every one , so watch it at your own risk. 7/10 By ANuP APu KuMaR
