The Accidental Prime Minister: Too Accidental to be a wholesome Movie
Bollywood has never had a decent political thriller till date. Every time it tries it has fallen flat excluding one exception which was Prakash Jha’s “Rajneeti”.
“The Accidental Prime Minister” is one such attempt based on the book written by Sanjaya Baru of the same name which chronicles Dr Manmohan Singh’s journey as a Prime Minister from the eyes of Sanjaya when he was the Media Advisor in the PMO.
This movie is unabashedly a strategic move before the election as the movie is complete anti Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. It basically shows how Sonia had the leash of the UPA government and how she manipulated various decisions making Dr Manmohan Singh just a puppet in the hands of the party.
Adapted screenplay has been credited to a group of writers including director Vijay Ratnakar Gutte, Mayank Tewari (Newton Fame), Karl Dunne and Aditya Sinha. The problem is, that there is no screenplay whatsoever, and you feel the scenes have been directly taken out from the book and the dialogues written on set. Another problem of the movie is the format, as it is neither a docudrama nor a full-fledged movie. The screenplay goes back and forth with no reference point. It deals with a lot of issues like the nuclear deal, the 2G scam but none is shown with a precision and left half baked. More emphasis is given on the various political big wigs who play the power game than to the happenings. The central character or the narrator Sanjaya Baru keeps on talking to the audience, somewhat like House of Cards wherein Kevin Spacey speaks to the viewers, but that concept is stretched so much that you tend to feel irritated after some time. An extremely shoddy work in writing. The dialogues also sounds forced.
If there is anything working for the movie it is the performance of Akshaye Khanna who plays Sanjaya Baru convincingly and earnestly. I truly feel Akshaye Khanna is the most under rated actor of Bollywood. Anupam Kher as Dr Manmohan Singh tries hard to copy his mannerisms and also succeeds, but in copying Dr Manmohan Singh’s mannerisms Anupam Kher forgets to give some depth to his character. Though we cannot blame Anupam Kher entirely because the writing was so shoddy, but somehow Akshaye Khanna rose up to the shoddy writing which Anupam couldn’t. Other actors like Suzanne Bernet, Arjun Mathur, Aahana Kumra, Divya Seth and the rest of the cast look and sound like caricatures.
Technically also the movie is extremely shoddy, especially the VFX. The VFX is so substandard that you can make out that the actors are actually standing in front of a Green Screen.
Director Vijay Ratnakar Gutte whose previous movies Badmashiyan and The Film Emotional Atyachar was nothing to write home about comes back with another shoddy product. He definitely needs to hone his directorial skills to take up such a subject.
It is so sad that such a good content went waste and what we are given is a half-baked, half done movie. You really feel that the movie was made in a hurry with the election in mind, I will go with TWO STARS.
Movie Rating: 
(2 / 5)