Cast:John Abraham, Anil Kapoor, Sonu Sood, Manoj Bajpayee, Tusshar Kapoor
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 3.5/5
A 'Shootout' you must witness!
Movies based on the mafia theme have always been popular in Bollywood, and filmmaker Sanjay Gupta takes on the task of telling the story of Bombay's first Hindu gangster, Manya Surve.
The story is set in the 70's and Manohar Surve (John Abraham) is shown as a sincere college student, who is in love with Vidya (Kangana Ranaut). However, circumstances force him behind the bars and he meets Munir (Tusshar Kapoor) in Poona Jail, who helps him take his first step in the world of crime.
ACP Afaque Baghraan (Anil Kapoor) along with his police force lead by Inspector Shinde (Mahesh Manjerkar) and Inspector Tambat (Ronit Roy) try to curb the crime in the city.
However, when they fail to do so they take help of the Haskar brothers - Zubair (Manoj Bajpayee) and Dilawar (Sonu Sood).
Manya is set to form his own gang that consists of Munir Goucho (Siddhanth Kapoor) and two other team members. Slowly but steadily Manya turns as strong as his opponents, the Haskar brothers. Both gangs co-exist until Manya tries to kill Zubair, and that's when all hell breaks loose.
Sanjay Gupta along with Abhijeet Deshpande and Sanjay Bhatia writes the screenplay really well, specially the sequence of the events. Milap Milan Zaveri has written some great dialogues that give power to various characters. The audiences in the theatres are bound to applaud to the dialogues by John and Sonu and especially Anil Kapoor's interpretation of 'Police Uniform ka color Khaaki kyon hai?'
Music of the movie is outstanding, Anu Malik's track 'Ala re Ala' is one of the best, especially the way Mika sings it. Anu's and Mika's magic works again in 'Laila'. Sunidhi Chauhan delivers another winner with 'Babli Badmaash'.
When it comes to the song picturisation 'Ala re Ala' is fun to watch and Sophie Choudry makes the song a perfect treat. Priyanka Chopra dances really well on 'Babli Badmash', however, you wish the song was longer. Sunny Leone in 'Laila' looks hot and dances well, but after a point her moves with John turn into a 'soft porn' song.
Action is awesome in 'SAW', the jail fight sequence between John Abraham and Chetna Hansraj is terrific. Even the Dhongri chawl action and Dhobi Ghat scenes are action packed. Action director Tinu Verma has also integrated some unique ideas like the Diwali Crackers and the crushing of the head on the 'Gola' machine.
John Abraham looks like Manya Surve every inch, in fact, there are moments when you will forget that you are watching John. From his physique to dialogues to expressions, John has worked really hard to deliver his career's best performance.
Sonu Sood is outstanding; he looks great, gives the right expressions and delivers impactful dialogues. Anil Kapoor is always bankable and he does full justice to his role. Manoj Bajpayee is good as always. Tusshar Kapoor is very confident and impressive. Siddhanth Kapoor makes a decent debut. Kangana Ranaut fails to deliver, in fact, she kills the momentum in the movie. Mahesh Manjerkar plays the lazy cop really well. Ronit Roy is good too.
'Shootout at Wadala' is the ultimate movie for the masses, and will do really well in small towns and single screens. Sanjay Gupta manages to deliver another 'Great Gangster Genre' movie.
