Last week, when the Tevar crew flew into Dubai to promote their film, they implored the critics to review their latest project keeping the masses who enjoy Bollywood masala films in mind. I did. But I have also come to the conclusion those Bollywood film lovers, with their voracious appetite for tales revolving around a larger-than-life hero (Arjun Kapoor), damsel-in-distress (Sonakshi Sinha) and a one-dimensional villain (Manoj Bajpayee), have gotten over that infatuation.
(Remember, that a crush that you have in your first grade is unlikely to be the grandest romance of your life. So why should it be any different when it comes to taste in films?) They surely deserve better than Tevar — at least in terms of providing twists on a done-to-death tale.
The story, set in Agra and Mathura in Northern India, is impossibly jaded (an uneducated henchman, Bahubali Gajinder Singh, falls in love instantly when he sees Radha, a buxom girl who loves to dance). A unsuspecting kabaddi champion, Pintu Shukla, with zero tolerance for violence against women, unwittingly gets involved in their spat and the next thing you know Pintu and Radha are both on the run. There is an army of sword-wielding men and corrupt cops on the hunt for them but the good-hearted Pintu ducks every one of them. He chants something along the lines of: “Kabaddi, kabaddi — should I twist your neck or break your bones” before slapping his beefy thighs and venturing out to demolish his enemies. As painful as those lines are to read, it’s more painful to watch him repeat them.
Seasoned actor Bajpayee tries his best to inject some believability into his insular, crazy-in-love rake. But even he is felled by dialogues such as “Did you think that there was just a scrapyard in here? There’s also a rose garden if you look closely,” pointing to his heart. This is his grand proposal to Radha before he decides to adopt some violent methods of persuasion. Now here’s a man who could have any girl in his village, but is fixated by Radha, who isn’t particularly impressed by him. When will villains in Bollywood learn to take no for an answer?
These are stock characters in Bollywood and even someone as talented as Bajpayee can’t redeem it. The highlights of the film are some of the crackling encounters between Pintu and Gajinder, but it gets tiring after a point. Actor Raj Babbar as Pintu’s feisty dad is a treat to watch. Plus, the rustic beauty of Agra and Mathura has been captured in all its shabby splendour.
The first half has at least three forgettable songs including one to introduce the greatness of Pintu (the perks of being in a film produced by your own family?) and then a song to display the greatness of Radha among others. Actress Sinha does her familiar routine of looking feisty, forlorn and furious. This song-dance-action formula that dominates Tevar has been regurgitated at least a few dozen times in Bollywood films, and therefore it’s difficult to savour here. Enter at your own risk.
