(MAJOR SPOILER ALERT. DONT READ AHEAD IF YOU HAVE ANY INTENTIONS OF WATCHING THE MOVIE RA.ONE. HAVING SAID THAT, I WOULD SINCERELY ADVISE YOU TO PROMPTLY GIVE UP ANY SUCH PLANS AND WATCH IT ON SONY TV TWO MONTHS LATER.
THE OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS POST ARE THE AUTHORS PERSONAL THOUGHTS. NO VANDALISM HOOLIGANISM AND BAD-WORD-ISM FROM SRK FANS AND SUDARSHAN SRIDHAR WILL BE TOLERATED.)
When I went to Sathyam at 5.30 AM on Sunday morning to stand in that long serpentile queue to get a ticket of Ra.One, the guy standing behind me annoyed me by laughing through the length of the queue. His point - What kind of a guy wakes up so early and stands in such a long queue to get the ticket of some random "saettu" movie. I ignored him, got the tickets, elated. I was going to watch SRK's film in theatre, On the FIRST DAY! The day has passed, and so has the movie. From this end of the equation, I laugh at myself - I mean what kind of a guy wakes up so early and stands in such a long queue to get the ticket of some random "saettu" movie that finally turns out to be this bad? Ra.One has been my biggest movie disappointment since birth. Maybe because I expected so much out of it, or maybe because of SRK's own doing - the intense hype that he created - the film just didnt take-off for me.
Ra.One("Raavan") or Random Access One is the most powerful villain ever made - an invincible villain - born out of a Video Game maker, Shekar Subramanian's urge to do something great for his son, Prateek (Armaan Verma), who feels that the best video game ever made will be the one where the villain cannot die. In an attempt to make the villain even more stronger to conquer, Shekar adds some "Artificial Intelligence Programming" to Ra.One that gives Ra.One the ability to think beyond what normal video games can, to avoid losing the game. Soon he develops an ego because Lucifer, Prateek's vitual world alter-ego, has defeated him in two rounds, and wants to come out to the real World to find and kill Lucifer. In the ensuing battle, Shekhar dies, and the only thing Prateek can do to save himself and his mom is to bring G.One or Good One, the hero of the video game built on Shekar's personality and looks, to reality too. Then begins the eternal Indian quest of the victory of good over evil and the film shows how the biggest battles are one, not by power of the body, but by the power of the heart.
Impossible science apart, the premise is pretty great and different from the sci-fi films seen yet. But there is no flow in the plot and the film is poorly scripted . The bad screenplay could've been made up with good direction, but there again, direction is a huge let down. This is probably what SRK's ghost directing the film did to it.
However, there are some reasons to cheer the film. Excellent graphics and awesome stunt scenes keep you engaged in the movie even when there's nothing else to watch out for. The Background Music though out of place in one or two scenes is classy throughout. The Vishal-Shekar duo has done an amazing job with the soundtrack of this movie. The Soundtrack has a couple of chartbusters and they make their mark in the film.
Music overall is a strongpoint that this film has, and Vishal and Shekar are maturing by the day, getting lots better. A great reason to watch the film would also be Arjun Rampal, though he has been virtually reduced to a guest appearance, appearing only in the last 45 minutes or so - good enough to make an impact as the cold, dreaded villain. Kareena Kapoor, far from her size zero days, looks awesome, though has nothing to do at all apart from use up the glycerine they stocked up for the film!
So where does Ra.One crash ? It has a seemingly good premise, and though not a very good plot, Bollywood movies rarely run on a great story anyway. It has great music, excellent World Class graphics, so then what exactly went wrong for Ra. One ? There are a couple of reasons, first of which I feel is SRK himself. The films got too much of him, to a point where you cant take it anymore. SRK features in every scene of the film and tries to become that Super hero. It is a noble attempt, no doubt, but it gets boring after a point of time. Comparisons to Endhiran (Robot) are expected initially, but you must know, Endhiran was a far better movie, in terms of both the entertainment quotient and a lot more sensible script.
His antics as Shekar Subramanian dont help matters much. The character is a Tamil stereotype, one that is not likely to go down very well with Tamil audiences (me included). A particularly bad example is how he eats noodles mixed with curd. That's lame. I do not eat noodles with curd. And I am yet to find one Tamilian who does, so what's he trying to do? It is in this kind of a background that he brings in his half hearted tribute to the Superstar, which though awesomely greeted and excellently executed, doesn't have the kind of impact it deserved because of the Shekar Subramaniam fiasco.
These factors apart, the biggest reason why I feel Ra.One fails to impress is the hype that he himself created. This is the best example of a mega promotion backfire. For the first few days, Chammak Challo was okay, but soon he went overboard trying to dominate every single space of advertising, giving interviews to Jaya TV and all, and that just collapsed. There were so many people I can think of who went to the theatre to watch the movie, already fed up with the whole Ra.One galatta.
Ra.One was a heartbreaker. But a heartbreaker with a heart. I wouldn't watch it again, nor would I recommend it to anyone, but it was an attempt to offer something no 10 year old Play-Station Lover has ever seen before. And as I left the theatre, my grandma was happy. She called me and said it was a very nice film and SRK was awesome in it. I couldn't help acknowledging the fact that Children and SRK fans will love this film. I smiled and told to myself - I am an SRK fan after all.
Rating : 2.5/5
Might've been 3 if it had been Shekhar Kapoor or Rathore instead of Subramaniam,
3.5 if Arjun Rampal appeared in the first half of the film.
Thats as good as it gets.
