'Force'(Hindi)
Director: Nishikant Kamat
Cast: John Abraham, Genelia D'Souza and Vidyut Jamwal
In the Hindi remake of 'Kakka Kakka', we’re introduced to an orgy of bad acting when John Abraham, bleeding from several orifices, climbs down a cliff and demonstrates a set of facial tics.
Flashback begins.
We see Maya (Genelia D’Souza) through his eyes.
She owns a scooter and a car, and she gestures a lot to kids, misleading the audience into thinking she works at a school for children with special needs. It turns out she teaches some indiscernible dance form, which she herself doesn’t seem to be particularly good at.
Meanwhile, the camera focuses on an advertisement for Streax, and on a tube of Fast Relief, and establishes the film as one that could give Viruddh - remember the John Abraham-Amitabh Bachchan starrer that sank without a trace? - a run for its money where in-film branding’s concerned.
We find out John Abraham is Yashvardhan, a cop who has a penchant for going to meet the bad guys without backup, and throwing bikes at them when he could shoot them instead.
Their paths cross when he’s beating someone to pulp outside the auditorium where she flounces about. She gasps. He gapes, apparently heartbroken at a stranger witnessing his muscle power.
That’s just the first time. They bump into each other several times - he in a sleeveless vest that shows off his waxed-and-tattooed arms, she in mismatched capris and kurtas.
She only gets drawn to him after he forgives a geeky friend of hers for taking a girl alone to a night show, not carrying any insurance papers, and trying to move a police barricade. Once he has Maya’s name and address, Yashvardhan loses interest in her, and goes about his business of hunting the dealers.
He and the nameless, henna- haired zonal head (played by Raj Babbar) recruit three other officers to sniff out the bad guys.
Aided by a lisping informer, they hunt down the usual suspects - a religious Afghan Muslim, a turbaned Sikh, a group of Eastern Europeans, and a Gujarati villager.
Carrying guns in much the same way that seven-yearold boys would brandish toy swords, they get most of the hardened villains to surrender either by throwing Molotov cocktails into their homes, or threatening to shoot them.
But one is elusive - a saffronised South Indian.
You figure out he’s South Indian when his Nepali-featured younger brother Vishnu (Vidyut Jamwal) addresses him as “anna” during a phone call.
Vishnu then beats up a bunch of Kenyans who’re holding him hostage, and arrives at Vishakapatnam by motorboat from Mombasa. They are the Reddy brothers.
Yes, as if to avenge forty years of Hindi-speaking villains in Telugu cinema, the makers of Force have put in Hindi-speaking Telugu antagonists.
As the four chase drug trails, Maya begins to stalk “ACP Sir”.
Between calling him up to handle a gang of amateur eve-teasers and twitching her face in a manner that brings to mind Sri Devi’s character from Sadma (Moondram Pirai), she gets so annoying that one is relieved when a car runs her down.
The audience begins to giggle when Yashvardhan self-consciously wipes a tear from his eye at the sight of Maya in a hospital bed. They make fraandship. They take a bus to a remote country house, comfortably located at the edge of a cliff for the climactic scene.
He says, “I had a great time, thanks” after she recounts childhood trips to the place with her now-dead parents. She says she loves him, and sexually harasses him into submission over the next few days. Before you know it, 'Khwaabon khwaabon' - the Hindi version of 'Uyirin uyire' - disorients you with the same music, scenes, and choreography.
Genelia, with a relatively svelter figure, looks less ridiculous doing the frog jump.
John’s modesty is assaulted by a group of ballet dancers, wearing cholis and tutus. Tellingly, when the song ends, the camera cuts to someone yelling “yeh sab bakhwaas hai!” Now that his love life’s sorted out, Yashvardhan is free to track down the baddies.
As he and his three stooges veer around corners at an angle, glaring into nothingness, their machismo clearly induced by a gaggle of silly wives and persistent gym trainers, you know you’re waiting for the villain to slaughter the lot.
As the climax approaches, the audience is rooting for Vidyut Jamwal.
The final fight is a lesson in carnal fulfilment, as two men with arguably the best muscles in Bollywood tear into each other at a butcher shop. The much-objectified John Abraham is off the spotlight for about 10 seconds, when the focus is on Vidyut Jamwal’s bleeding abs.
Reasons to watch the movie: You didn’t understand the Tamil version, you find a beefed-up John Abraham sexy, or you want to laugh through three hours of violence.