CAST: John Abraham x 3, Divya Khosla Kumar.
DIRECTOR: Milap Zaveri
BLUF
Twins, Satya and Jay justify extra-judicial killings and lynching of the guilty in the name of removing corruption from society — a cause for which their father, farmer leader Dadasahab Azad, laid down his life.
The second installment of the Satyamev Jayate franchise is a kind of disaster that filmmakers justify as a mass entertainer. Over the years, Bollywood has extolled vigilantism and mob justice. John Abraham needed a triple role to drive extreme nationalism home.
THE MEAT AND THE POTATOES
Patriotism is a funny animal, if only because no one can ever agree on what it means, exactly. Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin felt those citizens who questioned and rebelled against an intrusive government were the truest of patriots, while only a few years later John Adams outlawed badmouthing the government. Was Joe McCarthy a patriot for trying to defend the democracy against subversive encroaching communism, or a sweaty, paranoid, power-mad psychotic? Is Edward Snowden a patriot for letting the American people know what their government was up to, or history’s greatest traitor for revealing US intelligence secrets to the whole world?
As far as Patriotism Gone Mad films go, however, there was no topping the Satyamev Jayate 2 for sheer cartoony shenanigans
National symbols and the names of freedom fighters are used to justify vigilantism. With multiple references to the 56-inch chest, the writers seem keen to create an illusion around the desired nationalist plot.
In the name of allegory, the banal highlight of the movie is two brothers both John, in saffron and green kurtas, sparring in front of their mother who is tied to a plowshare. Trynna evoke Mother India feels.
The villagers also take the shape of the country’s map to lynch the real villain.
IN THE KNOW
It is like writer-director Milap Zaveri read every Twitter trend for the last year and conjured up an incomprehensible storyline around contradictory allegories.
Milap Zaveri fails at the magnum opus he was trying to create for the millennials. The movie fails the logic loops and the language in the script is highly outdated.
In the last few years, John has established a reputation for great work. Here, in a role that is volatile on paper, his limitations are posed bare.
He is not such a brilliant actor.
Such is the extent of snarling and wailing that after a point one wonders whether Zaveri wants the fans to watch the film sitting comfortably or cringe in disgust.
You get the drift.
For filmmakers’ patriotism has always been an easy card to play and a sure-fire crowd-pleaser. People sure do love to wave little American flags and chant “U-S-A! U-S-A!” when given the chance. Thousands of films have been made over the past century which celebrates American individualism, ingenuity, tenacity, and firepower. Mostly firepower.
WHAT WE LOVED
Nada
WHAT WE MISSED
Everything. Including logic
