Sanju

SANJU

Duration : 129 Minutes Genre : Biopic

CAST Ranbir Kapoor : He plays Sanjay Dutt. I must say that this is Ranbir's best performance till date. He went into the soul of the character. Pure brilliance! Paresh Rawal : He plays Sunil Dutt. His performance was genuine and his on screen presence was strong and flawless. Vicky Kaushal : He plays Kamlesh, Sanjay Dutt's best friend. His role was equally vital and he performed really well in despite of sharing screen space with senior actors. Sonam Kapoor, Dia Mirza, Manisha Koirala and Anushka Sharma : The whole female cast was well ensemble and all 4 portrayed their roles well. Jim Sarbh : He played God. Jim always outdoes himself, and he doesn't disappoint here.

PLOT As we all know Sanju is a Biopic on the different stages of Sanjay Dutt's Life. Raju Hirani not only displays Sanjay's life story but also teaches us life lessons (As he always does). There was a dialogue in the movie which said "The person with the most failures, has the best stories." Sanju is indeed those stories. Raju Hirani executes the script skillfully and one gets to see every emotion in it.

SOUNDTRACK Sanju's music doesn't really leave a mark except for the track Kar Har Maidaan Fateh which is extremely motivating as is also my favorite.

Movie could have been cut short by an hour. or focused on other more interesting aspects and people in Sanju's life - his wives/family, his relationships with other big stars (Madhuri Dixit, Salman khan?).. That material is completely missing from the movie. Too much screen time for the Kamli friendship angle. Boring. The drug addiction part dragged on way too long. I wouldnt consider this movie a biopic as it was only focused on portraying Sanju as an innocent victim of the unfair media coverage. The guy has repeatedly made bad choices in his life and we are supposed to feel sorry for him. Yaawn. Melodramatic background music was annoying. Ranbir's acting was good though. Would surely win him many awards. Cant rate it more than 5 stars. but its an ok movie compared to other junk that bollywood churns out.

If you are a 90's kid, probably you would have grown up to see Sanjay Dutt 's outstanding performances in films like Khalnayak, Vaastav or Munna Bhai Series in early 2000. Sanjay Dutt is definitely one of the finest actors we have in Bollywood and there is no doubt about it. However, the question popped up in my mind when I saw the trailer - Was a biopic on Sanjay Dutt even required ? Ofcourse, Sanjay Dutt is popular for his controversies which could add masala required for a movie. Bollywood have legends like Amitabh Bachchan, Dilip Kumar or Guru Dutt. Why not make a film on them ? Let us see how the film "Sanju" has fared ..

Sanju is a chronicle on journey of controversial Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt right from his film career, personal life, affairs to the present state.

Directed by master storyteller, Rajkumar Hirani, who has given some fantastic message oriented films like Munna Bhai M.B.B.S, Lage Raho Munna Bhai, 3 Idiots and P.K, Sanju is probably his weakest work till date. The movie begins in a flashback mode showing the early days of Sanjay Dutt and how he got into drug addiction. Few scenes are outstanding - Sanjay Dutt's relation with his mother Nargis Dutt, the scene where he comes in the middle of night to steal the bottle of alcohol from his girlfriend's house. Even the scene at the hospital where he cries over a dead body is hilarious. However, the screenplay starts losing focus towards the intermission. The second half picks up slightly showing Sanjay Dutt's encounter with gangster and underworld. But too much of melodrama tends to bore you. None of songs leave impact while background score is sometimes too loud. Also, I felt the story was told as if there so many excuses being made for all the mistakes done by Sanjay Dutt to gain sympathy for him and show that he is a victim for all his crimes.

The silver lining is the performances. Ranbir Kapoor gives his career best performance. When you will watch the movie, you will notice his style of talking , walking and even voice is accurate to that of Sanjay Dutt's. Manisha Koirala , Sonam Kapoor and Diya Mirza are fine. Anushka Sharma is wasted in a minuscule role. Vicky Kaushal is superb while Paresh Rawal is good though he resemblance to Sunil Dutt is very less.

Overall, Sanju is one-time watch thanks to the stupendous performance by Ranbir Kapoor. Decent 2.75/5

Its a roller coaster ! Raju Hirani's portrayal of Sanju is a MASTERPIECE ! Ranbir Kapoor as Sanjay Dutt is more Sanjay Dutt than Sanjay Dutt ! The guy is phenomenal ... flawless acting ... short of superlatives to describe his act ! Vicky Kaushal playing Sanju's best friend was amazing in his character ... plays an important role and does full justice. Paresh Rawal playing the legendary Sunil Dutt is wonderful ! Everyone else is just as good ! Hirani does a fantastic job in summarising Sanjay Dutt's biography in a 3 hour movie ... what an amazing story it is ... what an amazing life it is. Ranbir has played the role of his life in this career defining movie ! Its A Must Watch !

I don't usually take it to write a review for a film even though I follow films very passionately. I have decided to do it because, although most of the critics lauded Ranbir's performance, I have seen few comments trying to belittle Ranbir's controlled, methodical performance by comparing it to Vicky's loudly written character. First of all, I never understood why to praise one actor, you need to degrade the other. Coming back to these specific performances, I believe both Ranbir and Vicky were outstanding in their respective parts, Vicky's character was written in a single note and was loud, he nailed it by giving a fine, loud, dramatic performance with a lot of spontaneity and sincerity and without going OTT. Whereas Ranbir's character had many shades and many episodes, Ranbir clinched each part with perfection. From getting Dutt's swag to his voice he almost disappeared into Sanjay Dutt but never went into mimicry or a caricature. It was a kind of a role where the biggest of actors could end up hamming, but it was the brilliance of Ranbir Kapoor that he held his foot. Now, people may find Ranbir less expressive compared to Vicky, but here he is not the usual actor Ranbir Kapoor, here he is playing Dutt. They both complimented each other very well, and Sanju-Kamli has to be one of the best male camaraderie seen in cinema in recent times

Now, coming to direction, story, dialogues and screenplay. The story was episodic, the screenplay was well written with few problems in the 1st half. The movie starts with an excellent note, the way they are building up the drama was terrific, could say the best of Hirani's work but suddenly they lose the track after the scene where Sonam's character cancels her marriage to marry Ranbir, the whole thing was very badly written and was not making any sense. After that, they go into full melodrama, every character from Vicky to Paresh Rawal to Ranbir was overdramatic. Then Har Maidan Fateh came to rescue. 2nd half was terrific, it was crisp and very well directed. Dialogues were very good, they were funny with a lot of punch lines, I was surprised to hear so many A-rated dialouges in the film, some were really creepy. Overall it was a very good entertainer with its soul in the right place most of the times. It would be 3 stars for the 1st half, 4 stars for the 2nd half and 1 extra star for Ranbir and Vicky's performance.