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Movie Review: 'Jigra' sizzles, then fizzles

The movie aims to topple the trope of damsel in distress being saved by older brother - does it work though?

Director: Vasan Bala

Cast: Alia Bhatt, Vedang Raina, Akansha Ranjan Kapoor, Manoj Pahwa

Rating: 2.5

The brother-sister relationship has been one of the longest-running tropes of Hindi cinema. Back in the ghastly 80s and 90s (the weakest decades for Bollywood), the role of a sister was primarily to get sexually assaulted so that her brother could flex his muscles and seek revenge, with the rakhi (sacred thread tied by the woman on her brother's wrist) providing the much-needed motivation.

The modern-day heroine, of course, does not need a man to protect her. On the contrary, she can take on the world and its monsters to save her brother from evil. Alia Bhatt’s Jigra, produced by Karan Johar and directed by Vasan Bala, is one such example where the roles have been reversed. Here, it is the damsel who is ready to set the universe on fire to save the dude in distress.

Does it work? The one-word answer: Nah.

At the end of two hours, one really wonders what the point of Jigra is. Is it a tale of extreme love and sacrifice where an individual is willing to forgo ethics to protect her own? Is it a story about morality vs justice? Is it a thriller about a daring prison break? Is it an action drama with tense, nail-biting moments leading to a shocking escape?

Jigra wants to be all of these and more. Alas it’s not!

Satya (Bhatt) and Ankur (Vedang Raina) play siblings who watch their father dying by suicide. The incident leaves them both scarred for life though Satya takes on the mantle of being the friend, guardian and protector to her little brother. She grows up to be a grumpy karate expert while he turns out to be a brilliant but socially awkward, reclusive and shy coder.

A twist of fate and some selfish relatives lead Ankur to be falsely implicated in a drug case in a fictional island called Hanshi Dao (a cross between China, Singapore, Malaysia and any of your favourite South East Asian countries) resulting in stringent imprisonment and imminent execution. Avenging angel Satya reaches there pronto, determined to move heaven, earth and hell to set her little bro free. A heavy task like this requires a team, and she is soon joined by a retired gangster, Bhatia (Manoj Pahwa), and a former prison guard, Muthu (Rahul Ravindran), both of whom have their own personal reasons for joining the good fight.

Jigra is that classic case of the second half undoing all the good work done in the first. The story is predictable from the first scene but around 20 minutes into the film, you feel drawn into the story. Satya is stoic with an inherent controlled rage that threatens to spiral anytime. Ankur is troubled, dealing with demons of his own. You are curious to know more about their relationship and how the tragedy impacted them but the filmmaker does not delve deep. Fair enough, this is not a relationship movie and some things are best left to the imagination. Yet there are some charming scenes, such as the one where Satya gets her brother to play a game of basketball to draw him out, to establish their deep bond without explicitly saying as such.

But when the action soon shifts to Hanshi Dao, the film’s tonality changes. The shift isn’t jarring and sequences showcasing Satya’s stress to figure out a way to rescue her brother are quite gripping.

You then look forward to a thrilling rescue act but that’s where Jigra unravels. The screenplay of convenience makes it look all so easy that the prison break comes across as a simple jog in the park. The last 20 or 30 minutes is one overstretched climax where petite Satya goes into full Rambo and Spiderman mode making perfect landings in a supposedly high-security prison, vanquishing policemen by the dozen, dodging every bullet.

Watching Jigra is a bit like a roller coaster. You start off on an even keel before it takes you on a high but then it plummets and hits a low, never really rising to the promise it initially showed. There is not much humour in the film but one meta reference to a prison roll call with names like John Woo and Wong Kar-wai had me chuckling.

What keeps the proceedings watchable are the actors, especially the leads Bhatt and Raina. As always Bhatt excels, with her pain and angst visible on her pretty face. And she is believable in the action scenes even if the action choreography is not. Supporting her ably is Raina, the charmer we saw in The Archies last year. Though he looks way too handsome to be a worn-out prisoner, he shows immense promise. And then there is the ever-reliable Pahwa, stealing every scene he is featured in. Vivek Gomber as the devious Indian-origin jailer deserves special mention as well.

Bala is an exciting filmmaker from the Anurag Kashyap school of filmmaking whose repertoire includes quirky tales like the festival-favourite Mard Ko Dard Nahi Hota and the neo-noir comedy Monica, O My Darling. His resume as a writer includes projects like Raman Raghav 2.0 and Bombay Velvet. Yet in Jigra he fails to strike the balance between mass commercial thriller and an intimate and intense relationship tale. Despite some clever elements like the use of old Hindi music during some intense action scenes and stylised cinematography, the film fails to come together as a whole.

Jigra also reminded me of a 90s film. Bollywood fans would probably remember Gumraah, starring Sridevi, Sanjay Dutt and Rahul Roy where Sri plays an innocent yet awkward singer who gets implicated in a drug scandal in Hong Kong by an unscrupulous lover (Rahul Roy). It is left to Sanjay Dutt to pull off a brave rescue from a scary prison manned by scarier, villainous guards.

The two films are as different as chalk and cheese but frankly, Satya should have contacted Sanjay. Her mission would have been far more fun.

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