A little into the second half of the 11.15 am show of Aditya Roy Kapur-starrer Rashtra Kavach Om at INOX (South City), someone ‘whispered’: ‘’Oi korechhe’’.
We all heard the ‘whisper’ loud and clear. There was pin-drop silence after all. How much noise could a dozen people raise? The film by Kapil Verma, however, raised lots of questions in my mind. The foremost of them being, if the compulsion to review this film had not been there, would I have dragged myself to the theatre to watch it?
Kapil Verma, the director, launched his audience into the world of Om Rathore too hurriedly. And then tried explaining as the film hurtled along, in the process jumbling up things even more. Aditya Roy Kapur (Om) had jumped into the Pacific Ocean (yes, you read that right), fought off 100,00000000 armed and muscled men alone (obviously) and landed at the bottom of the ocean bed and that too with a bullet lodged one inch into his brain (which, I think stayed lodged through the two-odd hours, with an additional one pumped into his stomach at the climax). I looked down at my phone for a nano second and the location had changed to some scenic locale with the pretty Sanjana Sanghi biking her way through the thick woods.
Rashtra Kavach Om (U/A)
- Director: Kapil Verma
- Cast: Aditya Roy Kapur, Jackie Shroff, Prakash Raj, Ashutosh Rana, Sanjana Sanghi
- Running time: 135 minutes
And, you’d have to be thick in the head to actually have some belief in the plot, inspite of the license of imagination. Nuclear scientist Dev Rathore (played by Jackie Shroff) had the formula to the ‘Kavach’, a defence mechanism which could take the steam out of missiles, a magic ammunition in India’s weaponry. One fine night, he was kidnapped and his house set on fire, with his son Rishi a witness to it all. It was alleged that the act of disappearance was hatched by Dev himself and he was labelled a traitor.
His brother Jai Rathore (played by Ashutosh Rana) didn’t believe that Dev could betray the nation and made up his mind to find his brother, prove his innocence and bring Kavach back. The former army man was now with the RAW and launched Operation Kavach to be executed by a special RAW wing. Para commando Om was the man who was trusted with the mission. Dev Rathore, Jai Rathore and Om Rathore had a shared family history too convoluted to be narrated in this space. Prakash Raj, entrusted to play Murty, had a Malik-from-Don-like track.
Hint hint! Rashtra Kavach Om seemed a fanboy film, the director mounting the invincible Om in Aditya Roy Kapur and putting him in every frame. EVERY. This could very well have been his launch pad to show off his wow body. Glistening, gorgeous, shirtless, 12-odd packs, Kapur did look smoking hot. He also looked convincing in the action scenes.Kapil seemed to put in a bit of everything.
Action, a bit of romance and an item number too featuring Elnaaz Norouzi, just like an afterthought. And then rushed towards a predictable ending lest a lockdown happened again.As I walked out of the theatre, the predominant thought in my mind was Jackie Shroff’s diet. At 60+, that man looked fit. Bhidu, how?