Johnson Thomas
This animal friendly message film is designed as an action adventure with Vidyut Jamwal essaying the role of Raj, a veterinarian initially lured by the city life, returning to the family-run sanctuary. A series of unfortunate events plague the sanctuary and it becomes incumbent that Raj uses his fighting ability alongside able help from Meera (Asha Bhat), a journalist from Mumbai and Shankara (Pooja Sawant), a mahout based in the sanctuary, to punish the illegal ivory hunters, who kill elephants to acquire riches.
The film (shot in Thailand) is located in Odisha and has verdant jungle greens as richly foliated backdrop for a rarefied adventure yarn. Director Chuck Russell who earned his stripes with Hollywood blockbusters like The Mask, The Scorpion King and Eraser finds the mainstream underpinnings of this story a little too flamboyant for his abilities and it shows in the manner in which he plots the narrative. The first 40-odd minutes dwell on establishing the presence of the main lead and his abilities and the rest of the runtime is involved in kicking butt in fighting martial arts styles ranging from straight-forward fisticuffs, Kung-Fu, Karate, Parkour and Kalaripayattu. The fight choreography is beautifully orchestrated by Chung Chi Li and Parvez Shaikh. In addition to Jamwal’s effortless stunt work, cinematography by Mark Irwin and Sachin Gadankush is vivid enough to ensnare and the elephants make their adorable presence heartfelt. Jamwal’s affinity with Bhola, the lead elephant, looks real and his face-off with the antagonist, lead poacher (Atul Kulkarni) while not exactly legend making, allows for some great action footage. The writing by Akshat Ghildhial, Suman Adhikary, Adam Prince, and Raghav Dar is rather generic and uninspiring. Even Chuck Russell doesn’t appear to have a strong handle on the telling. The editing is slick in patches and the rest of the tech credits are laudable. The thrills don’t sustain for long though and the memories of them are forgettable at best. This film entertains in fits and spurts. There’s no sustained campaign to win over the audience.
from The Tribune https://ift.tt/2WzMXak
via Today’s News Headlines
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