Deewaar - POW to this POW film! (Deewaar (DVD))

Member Name: anonymili

Product:	Deewaar (DVD)
Date:	24/08/09 (40 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good cast

Disadvantages: Plot holes, film is too long

Deewaar was released in 2004 and is a multi-starrer with Amitabh Bachchan, Akshaye Khanna, Sanjay Dutt, and Amrita Rao with support from Tanuja, Raghuvir Yadav, Kay Kay Menon and Akhilendra Mishra. The film's full working title is "Deewaar - Let's Bring Our Heroes Home".


THE PLOT

Major Kaul (Bachchan) was caught with around 30 of his fellow officers and imprisoned in Pakistan during the war between India and Pakistan in 1971. They have been constantly treated abominably and 33 years later the Major's son Gaurav (Khanna) sneaks into Pakistan from India on a mission to get his dad back home. Once there Gaurav manages to team up with Khan (Dutt) who was imprisoned for a brief period with his father but is he all he seems to be? Who can be trusted in this strange country where you can be shot for having a box of matches made in India? What nightmares will Gaurav face in his struggle to free his dad and will he survive this dangerous mission?


THE GOOD

Deewaar is an edge of the seat kind of film, it has you drawn into the story from start to finish and really rooting for the POWs imprisoned and tortured on a regular basis to escape the hell they've endured for over 30 years. You find yourself despising the prison governors who treat their charges so appallingly yet see the solidarity between some of the prison guards and the inmates who, like them, are also soldiers. The plot was clever although it felt very familiar and it wasn't till halfway through the film that it clicked that this was a Bollywood version of a rather famous war film - although I won't give the name of that film as it will pretty much give away the whole plot of Deewaar - although of course, being set between Pakistan and India, the story was fairly Indo-centric.

The whole film is well acted from start to finish and despite Pakistan being shown in a fairly bad light there are some genuinely picturesque scenes shown of the country during the film.

It was nice to see Tanuja in a film, she's a great actress although in her twilight years now, it's a shame she didn't have more screen time.
Kay Kay Menon did well in his role as the prison governor in the second prison that the Indian POWs are sent to. He was definitely more menacing as a villain than the clown of a guy (forgive me, I don't know who the actor was) in the first prison who wore a way too much eyeliner to be taken seriously as a bully of a governor.

I liked Sanjay Dutt's character in Deewaar. He plays an Indian Muslim who considers himself neither Indian nor Pakistani - he's just a rogue but a likeable one. When he manages to escape from the prison and Gaurav saves his life you see a scene where he goes to what I assume was a brothel. Just an excuse for the director to have another song and dance routine of course but I found it highly amusing that Gaurav goes with him considering he's there in Pakistan to rescue his father. Are they implying that come what may, men always have time for a bit of skirt..?!

I'm going to talk about Akshaye Khanna in "The Good" section too as I have a soft spot for him. He's not a fabulous actor (yet) but he is credible in most roles I've seen him in. I'm definitely finding myself liking his acting far more than I did his famous father before him (Vinod Khanna) and he's quite cute so that's definitely a plus.


THE BAD

Firstly, why are there songs in a POW film? I know Bollywood has to have songs in pretty much all of its films but was it really necessary to thrown in a handful of songs set in a prison or several other places during the film? It detracted from the plot and lost the film points for unnecessary padding out of the film. 6 songs was way excessive, they should have honestly got rid of 5 of them if not all of them! The only song which I felt had any meaning and/or any place in the film was one in which the Indian prisoners sing a song of solidarity proclaiming that they will not be beaten.

Amitabh Bachchan is a fabulous actor but I think his judgement has been a bit strange in recent years when it comes to taking on roles which are doomed to fail. He seems to be doing at least 4 or 5 films a year in the last decade which means that he's not really being choosy about roles he takes on. This is probably one he should not have taken as I doubt this was a box office success nor was it good for his reputation. He acted well and did what he could but the film was pretty much a dud.

There was a romance between Gaurav and the Radhika (Rao), the daughter of the Hindu man who gives him shelter when he gets to Pakistan to plan his father's escape.


THE ANNOYING

There are some scenes rather gratuitous scenes of violence - read torture - which I felt were slightly overdone to get the point across that the Pakistan officials were really despicable people whilst of course the Indians were portrayed as saints. I don't imagine films like this do anything for relations between the two countries, although I imagine films made in Pakistan would show the Indians in a bad light and their own people as the good guys. Politically correct this film is not.

When the POWs manage to get a letter home to India to say they're still alive and being tortured, the Indian government seem to want nothing to do with them, basically they hang them out to dry and say they won't investigate because it will damage relations between the two countries. Yet shortly afterwards an investigation is under way by Human Rights to check out the conditions of the jail where they're supposedly being held. Of course the Indian POWs are moved to a different prison but funnily enough the guards who sympathised with their plight don't seem to speak up about what was going on despite saying that their God will protect the POWs. Strange!

There were some glaring holes in the plot which made me cringe. Gaurav is shown to be a snivelling dorky kind of guy in the initial scenes, throwing tantrums because his daddy wasn't there when he was growing up and getting a good slap to sort himself out by his mother (Tanuja). When he gets into Pakistan (which is shown to be done so easily), he's suddenly this guy who can kill easily and fights like he was trained his whole life to do so, we don't get this impression of him at the start of the film, although he see his character briefly trying to deal with the fact that he's killed a man for the first time.

Gaurav has a romance with Radhika, the beautiful Amrita Rao, whose presence brings some glamour and beauty to the film. They have a fairly raunchy song and dance routine which will definitely appeal to the voyeurs in the audience but as I said earlier, it's a war film, what were they thinking of having so many songs in the film? Directors, take note: not at all relevant! Shame they used such a decent actress for the token female role. What a waste!

I didn't get the ending of the film. Without giving too much away, where on earth were the border guards between India & Pakistan? As far as I'm aware the border is manned by both countries 24 hours a day. Maybe I'm just talking out of my hat...


THE CONFUSING

Weirdly enough there was another film called Deewaar which also starred Amitabh Bachchan which was released in 1975. I bought this film thinking I was buying that film but realised it was different when I saw the cast list! I didn't bother sending it back as I was lured into watching the film due to the cast list who are mostly actors I really enjoy watching. Don't make the same mistake; this film bears NO resemblance to the original bar having the same lead. Why couldn't they come up with a different name?!

I'm not sure why the film has been given such a high certification. It could quite easily have been given a 15 or even a12. An 18 seems rather excessive.


THE RATING

If you're a diehard war film fan you might enjoy this. Plot holes aside it's just about watchable. I doubt I'd watch it again. I can't give it more than 2 out of 5. Ebay, here comes this DVD...


THE TECHNICAL

Director: Milan Luthria
Producer: Gaurang Doshi
Duration: 175 minutes
Certification: 18
Availability: Amazon £12.98, Eros £1.69
DVD extras: none of note on my version, just selection of subtitles, individual songs and future releases

Summary: Not really recommended unless you are a die hard war film fan