Sarkar had done it and done it with much more dexterity. It did not have to adjunct to itself half a dozen of famed actors to look convincing. There was a Sarkar, one could understand why the public favored Sarkar, aptly it showed how Sarkar found enemies and in the end, the murders were justified. Now politics is definitely one word that can provide justification to anything unjust. However, Mr. Jha definitely needs to clarify as to what was the necessity of such aggravated vandalism only to depict the greedy and vicious nature of almost all his characters. Nevertheless, unlike Sarkar, some basic details remained untold!
When a movie has a title as such, a luminary star cast, and a director who has himself had an experience of the real Raajneeti, all you expect is- Hard core politics. Unfortunately, however, Raajneeti runs on some of Bollywoods most hit storyline’s with the schemes of the protagonists not being too novel. Probably, politics being too simple hurts! It, not being eclectic is what that gets indigestible.
The film is all about the hostility that arises in one political family. One can experience a saga of animosity that only gets vehement with time. Now the ‘battle’ has Arjun Rampal & Ranbir Kapoor on one side and Manoj Bajpayee & Ajay Devgn on the other. Blood is not thicker than water for them for they could do anything for power. Well, no one expected staunches for politicians, so this is no surprise. The surprise is, however, how restricted the politics in Raajneeti is. Far from giving us a bird’s eye view, the movie is busy revolving around the Pratap family!
With actors as such, performances were bound to be terrific. And, indeed they were. However, had the storyline and characterization been focused more, the film too could have turned terrific!
Talking of the characters, Manoj Bajpayee is seen playing the arrogant Veerendra Pratap and he is as impressive as ever. But discredits to the writers for having failed to create the character well for he is hardly seen playing politics and gets too dependent upon the not very useful, Ajay Devgn! Worse, he is not seen giving any “karara jawab” to anyone, much against his claims to do so!
Nana Patekar well plays an astute character bearing a nearly irritating smile with him all the time. Thankfully, this man has some political acumen and easily identifies to a politician.
Ajay Devgan starts well but his character gradually seems to fade and languish. Why? What happened all of a sudden? The writers simply abduct spark and charm out of Sooraj. Left a victim to Nana Patekar’s little politics, this man suddenly refuses to understand the nature of politics despite having the actual heir of the Rashravadi party, Veerendra Pratap to his side. He appears to be burning from within and angry for God-knows what reason.
Katrina plays a typical sacrificing woman and manages to deliver a fine performance. Her character is simple and thanks to that, understandable.
Ranbir Kapoor very well plays the mysteriously taciturn, callous Samar Pratap. He is into the role completely and you could hate him for that! He is extremely shrewd and the director-writer duo seems to have done injustice to the others by making Samar Pratap a one complete package. Possibly, that is why Devgn was lamenting!
Now, acting wise, this man was the best (perhaps besides Manoj Bajpayee) - Arjun Rampal enthralls you with a stupendous performance (this is called ACTING!). He makes you admire Prithvi Pratap for being rampant! Again, credits off the duo for this though amazing yet implausible creation! Prithvi is simply too hot headed to even stand in the elections, far from being a Chief Minister!
Getting back to the film, if nothing else, it could have at least had a better sense of humor! They had Nana Patekar after all! And who does not know that Indian politics can provide great scope to comedy! Direction wise, it was no treat. Jha also failed to create a full-fledged two-sided battle. The speeches did no good either. Apart from one or two catchy lines, the speeches hardly provided content for us to devour or savor nor were they used to instigate the mob in an astute manner. Shakespeare would perhaps laugh watching the speeches go in vain in that fashion! Talking of what was good, the subtle bond of love shared by Prithvi and Samar was worth watching. Also, the songs of the film are fantastic, however, one would better relish them on an audio.
Overall, Raajneeti is just another fictitious Bollywood film suffering a weak story line. Anguish, hatred and bloodshed cannot be a treat to watch after all!
RATING- **1/2
