The fact that Rohit Shetty’s cop universe (of which “Sooryavanshi” is the third film, or fourth if you count “Singham 2”) started off with his unnecessary and lackluster remake of Surya’s magnificent “Singham” deeply hurts. That Ajay Devgn is better known as Singham, even though his performance pales in comparison to Surya, is even more disheartening. That Rohit Shetty continued his cop movies with another unnecessary and lackluster remake of another good south Indian film, Puri’s “Temper”, is appalling. That Rohit Shetty then had the brilliant idea of copying, not only south Indian films, but the success of Marvel films with their idea of cinematic universes, translating it into a cop cinematic universe still has me in disbelief.
Shetty, a smart business man (all of his Hindi remakes are stellar box office hits), essentially spent the last decade profiting off the originality of great South Indian directors, writers, and actors whose cop films will likely never have as larger of an audience as the Hindi versions. But I guess that’s just good business.
By now, you can probably tell that I’m not the biggest Rohit Shetty fan, nor was I someone who was eagerly awaiting this film. But we’re hopefully in the tail end of a pandemic, movie theaters are finally opening back up again and this was the first Indian film that I have seen in a theater in over a year. Despite my reservations about Shetty and his ridiculous cop universe, I went in with a hopeful mindset.
“Sooryavanchi” is an interesting addition to the Shetty cop universe because it breaks from the convention of copying great south Indian films into terrible remakes by simply being a terrible film in and of itself. “Sooryavanchi” doesn’t have enough action, contains maybe one good set-piece, doesn’t have much comedy, the romance is a disaster, and it all rides on a ridiculously clichéd plot.
For those of you who were expecting an avengers styled cop movie, you will be disappointed. The trio of cops come near the end of the film, it doesn’t last very long, and it isn’t as good as it could’ve been. But it does add some spice when the film verges on becoming totally bland.
I don’t know if this is just a coincidence or not, but Akshay Kumar’s character here has the same exact backstory as his character from “Bell Bottom”, released just a month ago. Veer Sooryavanshi’s parents die in a terrorist attack, Sooryavanshi becomes an anti-terrorism agent, and then he goes on to take revenge on the Pakistani terrorists that killed his parents. I guess this film isn’t that original after all.
One thing that I thought was well done was the characterization of the Pakistani terrorists. Usually in these type of films, they are simply bad guy caricatures but here you understand their motives even if they are utterly deplorable people. Then again there is a subplot that involves Pakistani terrorist sleeper cells that have infiltrated Hindu communities all over India that begs to question what this film is trying to say about trusting those around you. But then again the film goes on to say that the real enemies in India are the Pakistani terrorist sympathizers and not the Indian Muslim community (the fact that the film has to blatantly make this clear shows you just how bad the situation is). There is also a rousing sequence where Hindus and Muslims save each other from a bomb blast. So I guess this film is trying to build Hindu and Muslim relations by pointing to a common enemy in Pakistan, but everyone and their mother knows that this issue is more complicated than that.
I also found it interesting how Shetty’s idea of a women empowerment character is Katrina Kaif as a damsel in distress who can’t go to another country without her husband’s permission. Nice.
Apart from one or two action scenes, there really isn’t much to this film. Honestly, the more I think about this film the less I like it so I’ll end it with saying that you really shouldn’t be going out of your way to see this film anytime soon or even later.
