Vedaa Review: John & Sharvari Couldn't Save A Messy Screenplay

★★★★★

Vedaa Review : Nikkhil Advani's Vedaa has a powerful subject of honour killing, which isn't actually new to Bollywood. It's not just used in films many times, but has become a part of crime soaps over the years. John and Sharvari's Guru-Shishya story is based on the dalit issues in a rural village that has a heart but not a body. Coincidentally, the timing of the film is so apt that it has to come when Maratha Kranti is taking over Maharashtra. Unlike other mass movies by John, Vedaa actually gave off many different vibes of a realistic mass action flick, only to lose the momentum in the last 30 minutes that has completely taken the film down.

Abhimanyu (John Abraham) slaughters a terrorist who killed his wife, Rashi (Tamannaah Bhatia). He is suspended from the army and then arrives at a village to get a job. The chief of the village (multiple villages), Mr. Jitender Pratap Singh (Abhishek Banerjee), likes Abhi's atheist attitude and gives him the job of an assistant boxing coach. There, Abhimanyu sees a low-caste girl, Vedaa (Sharvari Wagh), who wants to participate in the competition and get a government job from the sports quota. Vedaa is humiliated and literally raped with words and intolerance by the high-caste people, who happen to be from Jitender's family. She struggles to find a place in the boxing training, but Abhimanyu helps her get in the ring. However, that doesn't help the casteism issues the entire village and Vedaa Bairava's family are going through. A teenage mistake (a regular one for us) by her brother makes them the enemies of the Singh family, and then they have to run for their lives. Abhi decides to get into the picture and begin a war against the "system."

Loaded with some powerful scenes, Aseem Arora's script indeed has a few power-packed scenes and socially evoking segments. The problem is that he takes a very old way to reach the destination. The entire idea of violence vs. justice doesn't really fit well. You are trying to build a legal case, and then the man who has to stand as an accused is doing killings openly, including many in the court premises. What was the case after all? You don't really have a case when the man is dead. Moreover, the outdated screenplay where you see bullets being fired from everywhere and not hitting the hero is what I call an outdated cinema. The same man can see a bullet coming to him with open eyes, but will he get hit at the end? He could have easily killed those people and would have killed himself many times, but nothing happens because it's a "movie." The film, which was looking realistic in the first half, goes completely fictional and overly dramatic in the second half. The last 30 minutes are too bad to consider the overall movie a decent watch. 

Performance-wise, it's a decent show. John has those massy moments as usual, but he also has some fine emotional moments. The character drags and has many flaws in the second half, but it's not his mistake. Sharvari does a decent job again. She has become a victim of outdated films, I guess. Be it Maharaj, Munjya, or Bunty Aur Babli 2, she just didn't get the character that has solidarity. Abhishek Banerjee plays a sophisticated villain who has more dignity and less action, but even he goes senseless towards the end. Ashish Vidyarthi and Kumud Mishra are wasted, and Tamannaah Bhatia doesn't have much to do in her role. The rest of the supporting cast is barely there to finish the scenes.

Vedaa begins with a super long disclaimer that the film has been fictionalised, and then, in the end, they show that the film is based on a true event and what happened after that climax event. The cinematography and sound design are okay, while the editing lacks excitement and grip. Nikkhil Advani has made many mistakes that cannot be overlooked, as they hamper and literally destroy the overall experience of the film. Vedaa could have been a decent film if it hadn't gone wrong in the last quarter. It really annoys you there, leaving you with no option but to hate the film. Anyway, a half-baked attempt, but an attempt afterall.