Wazir

Wazir:

 Amitabh Bacchan beckoned as few in Hindi cinema can at 70years of age and plans to watch Wazir materialised. The added allure of Farhan Akhtar on a Vidhu Vinod Chopra provided platform was the clincher.

As with almost all the movies I see, I went with zero expectations, but came out impressed and touched. It's a terror and vendetta plot, with personal traumas thrown in for the two protagonists.  Both Amitabh and Farhan have lost their daughters, albeit under different circumstances. While Farhan's 4 year old daughter gets shot dead in an encounter that he engages in with a bunch of terrorists as an ATS officer, Amitabh's much older daughter died due to a fall at a Minister's house where she worked as a chess coach to the Minister's 13 year old daughter. The similarity is that while Farhan blames himself for his daughter's death, Amitabh doesn't quite believe in the official version given out by the police and wants further investigation into his daughter's murder.  

The two meet under circumstances, which we later find out were contrived, and try and provide succour to each other. Their friendship and bond is surreal, but credible! While Amitabh, as the Chess maestro teaches Farhan to not only play chess, but also to lead his life equally strategically, Farhan takes it upon himself to investigate the older girls death, in the process earning the ire of his seniors. 

With a heavy chess analogy in the film, the title and much else in the film are a dead give away and tell-all, making the mystery a little diluted! The reason is not far to seek. The movie suffers from poor scripting! But dialogues in the film do succeed in touching some emotional and sensitive chords.  Given the  shortcoming with the script, the Director has done a fine job of taking it forward  with some engaging sequences. How can a villain be so evil as to burn the wheel chair of a double amputee, you wonder! Some other scenes between Amitabh and Farhan and between the ATS types are gripping. 

If script is the weakness of the movie, powerful acting by Amitabh is its strongest point. Amitabh as the wheel-chair bound, grieving but commanding Chess Master has done a superb job.  Farhan is also very good, although I have to say he is a bit flat, monochromatic and predictable! Aditi Rao Hyadri emotes well as the grieving mother of the slain little girl. She shuts her husband out of her life for being the cause of all the grief! It takes Amitabh's craft and some good dialogues to bring the Beghum back to her Shauhar! The Minister from Kashmir hides a terrible past in his closet, but the revelations on Badshah and Wazir, do not surprise you! That's a missed opportunity. 

There is some further good acting by the Minister, but an equally below average one by John Abraham! The ephemeral Neil Nitin Mukesh comes and goes without impact! 

I would go with a 3 on 5, and much of it is because of the acting!