Saif Ali Khan is here this weekend with his much-awaited movie ‘Laal Kaptaan’. Saif Ali has yet again done an unusual character of a ‘Naga Sadhu’ in this movie. The movie has been anticipated for its character looks and trailers. People had high hopes because of the different promos that had been released and let us find out whether it has lived up-to the expectations of our audience or not.
Directed by: Navdeep Singh
Produced by: Sunil Lulla, Anand L Rai,
Written by: Deepak Venkatesha, Navdeep Singh
Starring: Saif Ali Khan, Manav Vij, Zoya Hussain, Simone Singh, Deepak Dobriyal
Music by: Samira Koppikar, Benedict Taylor
Cinematography: Shanker Raman
Edited by: Jabeen Merchant
Production Company: Colour Yellow Productions, Eros International
Plot
The film is based in the late 17th century era of post Battle of Buxar in the area of Bundelkhand. The movie is based in that time of history of India where Marathas were losing their grip, the Mughals, the Pathans and the Rohillas were all struggling, and the East India Company was gaining territory by leaps and bounds. The movie tells us about the story of betrayal, revenge and fortitude. It revolves around a Naga Sadhu named Gusain. Laal Kaptaan is basically the story of Gusain who travels with his sidekick to find and kill his enemy Rehmat Khan.
Review
Saif Ali Khan is known for doing unusual characters. In fact, he has done a few memorable characters such as ‘Langda Tyagi’ in ‘Omkara’ and ‘Boris’ in ‘Go Goa Gone’. Honestly speaking Saif has again tried his best to portray Gusian the Naga Sadhu to best of his ability but the script has failed him miserably. Saif has done justice with whatever he was given in the overcrowded script. Chote Nawab has genuinely tried to put some weight in the character and should be given credit to do so. Although, the story would have looked great as a script but somewhere got lost while coming on to a reel. The other characters have also failed to support the main character because of the shoddy storyline. Navdeep Singh has done magic with these dark scripts in the past such as ‘Manorama Six Feet Under’ and ‘NH10’. Unfortunately, this time he has failed to recreate the magic of the past. The only noticeable other characters that provide some strength to the movie with their comic characters are done by Deepak Dobriyal and Madan Deodhar. The women in the film Simone Singh and Zoya Hussain have tried to give great performances but again as I have mentioned above, there was not much story in the script to show their craft.
The movie has tried to correctly capture the theme during the late 17th century by using dialects such as Hindustani, Awadhi, Marathi and little Bengali as well. The effort to capture the 17th century is commendable. The make-up artist is to be given full points here for his efforts on all the characters.
Our View:
However, all said and done I would not personally suggest someone to go and see Lal Kaptaan. Saif is great, the sets are great but again the villain here is the lengthy, overcrowded script.
