Rocky Handsome: Too Brawny Less Brainy

Nishikant Kamat is recognized as a film maker who makes sensible cinema what with “Domibivili Fast”, “Mumbai Meri Jaan”, “Force”, “Lai Bhari” and “Drishyam” remake. “Force” was undoubtedly one of the most stylish and path breaking films of 2011, it actually established John Abraham as an action hero…

With “Rocky Handsome”, Nishikant Kamat again comes together with John Abraham to re-create the magic of “Force” again. This time they choose to adapt the 2010 Korean hit “The Man From Nowhere”…. It tells the story of Kabir Ahlawat (John Abraham) a man with a past and who runs a Pawn shop in the by lanes of Goa, the only person he is close to is Natalie (Baby Divya Chalwad) a child who is his neighbour. Problem starts when the drug gang lord Kevin (Nishikant Kamat) kidnap Natalie and kills her mother Anna (Nathalie Kaur). Kabir goes onto a rampage against Kevin to find out Natalie, whether Kabir is able to find Natalie is what the story is all about….

Adapted by Ritesh Shah, the screenplay relies heavily on the action sequences, and fails in content. The first half struggles to set up a story and the movie oscillates from being a thriller and action movie. The back ground story of the principal character Kabir is never explored properly right till the end of the movie. Another issue of the movie is it tries to explore all crimes, right from Drugs to illegal organ trade to child trafficking and fails to focus on one making it a jamboree box. One of the main issues of the movie is that none of the characters are very well defined and hence the portrayal looks superfluous. It is said that the antagonist needs to be strong in any action packed movie, unfortunately the antagonist in “Rocky Handsome” look meek and the main protagonist looks like a super hero who can do anything. All the antagonists in the movie look like psychos, and it becomes dawn irritating after a point. Overall the screenplay looks more like a relay of action sequences placed one after another with no relevance to story or content…The dialogues unfortunately remain average keeping the movie flat….

Unfortunately the performances also lack the punch. John Abraham as Kabir Ahlawat has only one expression all throughout the movie and looks convincing only in action sequences where he is punching baddies black and blue. John just sleepwalks through his role making no impact. Nishikant Kamat as the baddie Kevin oscillates being serious and quirky at the same time and ends up half of the time hamming. Sharad Kelkar as the ANC officer impresses must say the actor has come a long way from TV soap operas to silver screen and making an impact as well. The one actor who melts your heart with her cute performance is Baby Divya Chalwad as Natalie, she actually overshadows John Abraham in a few scenes. Divya is definitely a impressive child protégé who has been introduced in Bollywood after a long time. Shruti Hasan in a song cameo looks beautiful…Rest of the cast like Nathalie Kaur, Kazu Patrick Tang, do an average job making no impact what so ever….

Well the real Hero of the movie is its action sequences by Kaecha Kampakdee & Sunil Rodrigues. The stunts are international quality with a lot of finesse though it quite gory at times… Cinematography by Shankar Raman is another highlight, he captures the action sequences as well as teh beautiful locales of Seychelles with equal finesse making the movie look good…

As far as the music goes there is only one song “Rehnuma” sung by Shreya Ghoshal & Inder Bawra and music scored by Sunny & Inder Bawra which is melodious….

Nishikant Kamat with “Rocky Handsome” gets the technical the technical aspect right with larger than life action sequences and an international look but fails in telling a story with finesse which has been his forte till now…

“Rocky Handsome” is your quintessential action saga which has more punches in the action sequences than in the content or performances…. I will go with 2 stars….

Movie Rating: (2 / 5)