'Samrat Prithviraj' Movie Review: Pity

Samrat PrithvirajUA Action DramaDir Chandraprakash DwivediCast Akshay Kumar Manushi ChhillarRating Yeah you do kinda pity Prithviraj Or Samrat Prithviraj as the filmrsquos title got changed lastminute mdash owing to perennially offended pressure groups No knock on Akshay Kumar mdash surely I love him as much you doBut therersquos something about this eternal entertainer in a terribly fake moustache As the serious warriorking with the seat of his Rajput power in Ajmer when I first hear him go ldquoKakardquo directed at his blindfolded uncle Sanjay Dutt I almost think hersquos gonna break into the hook steps lsquoBala Bala Balahellip Shaitan ka saalarsquo from Housefull 4Kumar of course redeems himself only in the climax mdash the gladiator scene shown to be Ghazni the dust bowl of Afghanistan mdash with the hero in a reality show of sorts the visuals really opening up looking grandiose enough to suit a period such as this That sequence should have been the palettetemplate of the whole pic in factWhat is instead An attempt at a film mdash with late 1100s Rajasthan in the foreground plus background mdash that absolutely no one stages better than Sanjay Leela Bhansali And who in turn makes all others look paleAnd I donrsquot mean this in terms of movements and colour or extracting the sheer joy and magic of the big screen where even Kamathipura can look inviting I mean it purely by way of drawing out characters and literally staging scenes mindful of the big momentsA marauding savage for a foreign invader Manav Vij opposite a pious local ruler for a desi period drama is anyway a tiring Bollywood trope mdash much like biopics itselfBut even with this intention I find not one moment in the movie where you feel anything at all mdash let alone for the king or his enemy Forget whatever its politics this pic just got no feels dost The rhetoric rarely matches the scenery I can barely sense the scale or see a hook to latch on toThe film is based on Prithviraj Raso an epic poem that was reportedly written hundreds of years after Prithvirajrsquos reign In the same way that Padmaavat was based on an equally epic poem mixing history with legendWhatrsquos similarly most perplexing therefore is a story that sort of glorifies lsquosatirsquo mdash a socially sanctioned suicide over a dead husband mdash and spends minutes after minutes posing as flagbearer of modern feminismRevealing at length how the Rajput king positioned his wife Manushi Chhillar as a political equal despite the sexistconservative spirit of his times Surely this is coming from the source materialAs is of course the main villain Incidentally to my eyes thatrsquos not so much the Muslimforeign invader Muhammed Ghori who Prithviraj had even once defeated captured and then let go As much as it is the kingrsquos own fatherinlaw from a neighbouring Rajput kingdom named JaichandBy the way Arnab type TV news anchors often go around calling their guests they disagree with on supposedly nationalist issues lsquoJaichandsrsquoAs I can see he was a ruler like any other who also wanted a piece of Samrat Prithvirajrsquos pie mdash like all greedy kings with conquering armies did in times when expansionism was a legit political goal That Prithviraj also eloped with Jaichandrsquos daughter mustrsquove hurt him bad Ethics be damnedGood to know What do I really learn about Prithvirajrsquos own life and times Frankly between Ghori and Jaichand precious little for personal focus or precious insight There is much grand garam talk about Hinduism mythology and dharam etc Except with zero context it just feels hollow Rather than add life to a herorsquos journey even if in an Amar Chitra Katha kinda wayIrsquom just impressed in general by the lsquoUrduisedrsquo Hindi that the characters from the Rajput kingdom speak in general mdash lsquomubarakrsquo lsquonapaak iradersquo lsquofariyadrsquo lsquobarkhastrsquo mdash given the original source Irsquom told was written in Braj Bhasha But then again why quibble over this when say nobody cares as much for Brad Pittrsquos American accent in a Trojan War film Troy 2004 eitherSo yeah the quibble is really with the general dullness of it all Itrsquos unforgivable for a picture with elaborate battle scenes for the sizzle and a period setting to transport you someplace else in time And itrsquos not only the actorrsquos job alone to lend a majestic touch to a film so huge The fault lies at the writerdirectorrsquos doorstep alwaysNot that he was a poor choice to begin with Chandraprakash Dwivedi is best known to rsquo90s TV viewers as the creator of Doordarshanrsquos Chanakya I havenrsquot watched that series since to test if itrsquos aged well Dwivedirsquos last film was a much more mediocre Mohalla Assi 2015Irsquom sure he has a good handle on Indian history And maybe the retellingreinterpretationrecounting of it was the point of this pic Only qualified historians can vet the facts from fiction here As they mustThanks for the frickinrsquo class thoughI know no educated person who gets their history from Bollywood movies Else wersquod be writing essays on Anarkali for an exam question on Akbar no

'Samrat Prithviraj' Movie Review: Pity

Samrat Prithviraj
U/A: Action, Drama
Dir: Chandraprakash Dwivedi
Cast: Akshay Kumar, Manushi Chhillar
Rating: **

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Home / Entertainment / Bollywood News / Article / 'Samrat Prithviraj' Movie Review: Pity

'Samrat Prithviraj' Movie Review: Pity

Samrat PrithvirajU/A: Action, DramaDir: Chandraprakash DwivediCast: Akshay Kumar, Manushi ChhillarRating: **

Trending Stories

Latest Photos

Latest Videos

Latest Web Stories

Mid-Day Fast

Samrat Prithviraj
U/A: Action, Drama
Dir: Chandraprakash Dwivedi
Cast: Akshay Kumar, Manushi Chhillar
Rating: **