Stree 2 movie review: No mystery—you’ve missed Stree!

Film Stree 2Director Amar KaushikActors Rajkummar Rao Pankaj TripathiRating 355Could there be a movie without an end I donrsquot mean an endless plot of course More like shorn of an extended climax where the filmmakers often get ahead of themselves while theyrsquove been straight and sorted all alongThe original Stree equally had endgame issues I recall this more from reading its review than the movie itself I guess thatrsquos why you write to rememberIn this case the film slips over into two nearly fulllength songs after an overlong conclusion adding further to selfreferential nods cameos franchise promisespossibilities while the end credits had been rolling all alongI suppose some of this shosha stuff comes via starsstudios not necessarily from storytellers per seThat said you judge a movie by the experience And not whywhenhow it ends I guess you also subconsciously judge that experience by how excited your fellow passengers felt when stepping out of the theatre As opposed to stepping in All the more for a sequelSpeaking of which itrsquos not a mystery that yoursquove missed Stree I know this from food counter guys at my local theatremdashamong the best boxoffice barometersmdashwhorsquod been warning me about ldquohousefullrdquo shows well before the picture openedAnd thatrsquos pretty much what I walked into at a Bandra cinema late into the night for a paidpreview before the moviersquos official releasemdashpacked with enthucutlets willing to laugh before a joke landed dying to shriek whether or not the visuals scared them Fear is in the anticipation aloneStree Sarkate Ka Aatank as in Part II is of course lsquohorror humourrsquo One manrsquos horror is anyway another manrsquos comedy But thatrsquos not what we mean hereIn light of balancing the two this film could have well been scripted on an Excel sheet With the picturersquos timeline on X axis and the genre on YWherein literally a spooky sequence follows a funny scene and so on and so forth Only the length of time for each genre varies But even those seemed somewhat equal to meI guess the ultimate feat in matching all thatrsquos going on into a Bollywood commercialmainstream grid is a proper lsquoitem numberrsquo starring Tamannaah BhatiaItrsquos rare to see how swiftly that gets retrofitted into the filmmdashsuitably taking the story forward still while the sensuous nautch number Aaj ki raat could top playlists at dancebars wherever they are None in BombayStree 2 has been neatlysmartly scripted by Niren Bhatt credited in the past notably for Serious Men 2020 Bala 2019 and Bhediya 2022 which is now part of Stree producer Dinesh Vijanrsquos funnysupernatural universe Bhatt can happily place this pic on top of his CVWhat kinda comedy is it Deadpan No Irsquod say Deadpoolmdashsame sorta franchise continuing in the superhero space check Deadpool amp Wolverine that similarly subverts supposedly serious situations with male plus metainside jokes on the movie industry popculture references with selfaware characters taking potshots at each other for who they areYou have to strain your ears sometimes to catch such lines Say when Pankaj Tripathirsquos character calls himself an old man another goes ldquoAap Atal hordquo citing his Atal Bihari Vajpayee biopicYou could find yourself googling who Sneha Kakkar is when she appears in a dialogue I guess they meant the singer Neha Kakkar and shersquod mindOtherwise itrsquos a series of puns Virgin tel oil virgin male Joggersrsquo ParkJurassic Park Disha Batani bits tits etc The film in my theatre came with English titles Thatrsquos a welcomingly inclusive touch Not that I saw how the jokes were getting translatedJust wished however that Irsquod consumed some of what that lady behind me hadmdashrolling over with laughter at every frickinrsquo line Such energies are hugely communicable Thatrsquos why we go to the cinema rather than sitting sullenly at home watching movies on OTT forever noThe actual comedy in Stree though completely emanates from the four lead actors jamming with such infectious familiar ease Yoursquore already on firstname bases with these guysmdashoriginally conceived by filmmakers RajampDKmdashas they step into the screen one by oneAdorable buffoons Bicky Rajkummar Rao Rudra Pankaj Tripathi Bittu Aparshakti Khurana Jana Abhishek Banerjee or for that matter Shraddha Kapoorrsquos nameless part You know their traitsYoursquore also aware of the subtle yet sturdy feminist undertones of the franchise Wherein men canrsquot step out of their homes in a hamlet called Chanderi in the first part And independentminded women with strong agency instead must lock themselves up in the secondThe penny drops as director Amar Kaushik puts it together almost perfectly again with that same lovable lot Hersquos since directed the manwolf Bhediya as well That was as much a bigscreen pop corny funI first got to know Kaushik from his short film debut Aaba available on YouTube about a terminally ill grandfather and child set in Arunachal Pradesh Nothing in that flick foretold his film career clearlyThe spooky parts of this horrorcomedy of course wholly belong to the directorrsquos eyecraft sufficiently teasing the audience with a headless monsterCarrying you through the ride Even when the film could be heading in many directions sometimes Thatrsquos actually the reason yoursquoll hear people say ldquoBicky pleejrdquo Yes and once more please

Stree 2 movie review: No mystery—you’ve missed Stree!

Film: Stree 2
Director: Amar Kaushik
Actors: Rajkummar Rao, Pankaj Tripathi
Rating: 3.5/5

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Home / Entertainment / Bollywood News / Article / Stree 2 movie review: No mystery—you’ve missed Stree!

Stree 2 movie review: No mystery—you’ve missed Stree!

Film: Stree 2 Director: Amar Kaushik Actors: Rajkummar Rao, Pankaj TripathiRating: 3.5/5

Trending Stories

Latest Photos

Latest Videos

Latest Web Stories

Mid-Day Fast

Film: Stree 2
Director: Amar Kaushik
Actors: Rajkummar Rao, Pankaj Tripathi
Rating: 3.5/5