SARKAR RAJ
BACK WITH VENEGANCE?  
by Vishal Verma

Rating: (½ EACH FOR THE 3 BACHCHANS)

A full page advertisement (read an appeal) in Khabre Bollywood – a self published weekly journal by cinema fanatics. It goes like this.

All the patrons of quality cinema and those who are still fans of the purana ‘Ramuji’ are requested to kdly share their creative ideas to the erstwhile prolific film maker – Ram Gopal Varma & provide him with some gyan on story & story telling. Techwezs pls excuse, that Ramuji has in plenty & he is doing it well.

You must be wondering why this advertisement appeared in the magazine which is primarily a free speak journal & is circulated amongst the film fraternity only and from very beginning it has the best comments from all the Kumar’s Khan’s and Bachchan’s much before the blog revolution started.

Let me tell you ‘Darling’, after the horrible experience of ‘Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag last year (some of the ardent readers of this magazine are still getting nightmares), the magazine made a case study and came to a conclusion that the guy has tried something which is not in forte so he can be pardoned for this taking ‘darling’ as an exception.

And the readers and the magazine were quite sure that ‘Sarkar Raj’ will put an end to the misery of ‘Ramu’ and also provide some quality high octane drama, action to the hungry souls of bollywood and make Ramuji and everyone proud.

 But what a shocker this ‘Sarkar Raj’ turned out to be, what was this Ramuji? You failed miserably once gain and this time it is more heartening. Sir, you failed in your forte of high octane action and political drama, which was so powerful and commendable before. Imagine the late legend Kishore Kumar disappointing while attempting a hoodling. So unfortunate. But still we have faith in God and ‘Ramuji’.

Wanna know the story

Well, When Anita Rajan (Aishwarya Rai – Bachchan – excels in a limited role), CEO of Sheppard power plant, an international Company, brings a power plant proposal to set up in rural Maharashtra, before the Nagre’s an insightful Shankar (Abhishek Bachchan – brilliant) is quick to realize the benefits the power plant cant bring to the people. After convincing Sarkar (Amitabh Bachchan- does the needful as always) who is against it for reasons not told, Shankar undertakes a journey along with Anita to the villages of Maharashtra to mobilize support of the masses.

They meet Rao Saab (Dilip Prabhawalkar- quite good) the mentor of Sarkar who gives the nod not to the liking of his son Sanjay Somji (Rajesh Shringapure- impressive).

The conflict begins when on one hand Shankar is trying to mobilize support from the villagers for the project and on the other hand Sanjay and his followers are protesting against what they considered to be a ploy to snatch their land.

Anyway, all this proceedings are very poorly established and executed.

Shankars two months pregnant wife Avantika (Tanisha Mukherjee- wasted) gets killed in a blast, Sanjay Somji gets kidnapped. Shankar settles scores with his wife’s killer (how on earth he came to know is a mystery). Rescues Sanjay Somji and in the meanwhile, the project goes to a singing gujarati businessman Kantilal Vora ( Upyendra Limaye disappoints) and when we get a feeling that now the zest of Shankar to fight for the betterment of his people will get a new twist, we are in for the shock of the century. Shankar is killed. Alas,  Khallas , magar hum bach ke rehae, courtesy some fine performance from the bachchan brigade and others.

Don,t run away, like you did previously there is still some test of your nerves on wait.

Sarkar settles scores with all those involved as if he is an encounter specialist and we wonder what the hell are we watching?. A gansta movie which kicked off as a high octane political drama?

While doing the cleaning job, the Sarkar explains that all this drama was to establish Sanjay Somji as the new leader of Maharashtra and to eradicate Shankar (how on earth he comes to this conclusion?). It makes you go bonkers; the entire plot was planned by the guru of Sarkar, Rao Saab. sob sob, what a pity. It’s really testing and hello Anita in the end is shown working for Sarkar and asking for tea. Aaiee, is there a Sarkar 3 in Ramuji’s mind?

Note : By the time you reading this, Ramuji is believed to be in talks with Vijay Krishna Acharya ( the man behind ‘Tashan’) so please act as fast as you can and contribute accordingly as mentioned in the first paragraph and be a part in this novel and global attempt to save bollywood especially Ramupur ka cinema.

Another note: the above write up is the writer’s take on Ram Gopal Varma’s ‘Sarkar Raj’ and there is no such ad has appeared in Khabre Bollywood (if there is any such magazine than it’s just a coincidence). So readers are requested not to disturb ‘Ramuji’, even though he desperately needs some treatment.