Movie: Kick
Director: Sajid Nadiadwala
Cast: Salman Khan, Jacqueline Fernandes, Randeep Hooda, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Pankaj Mishra, Mithun Chakraborty, Nargis Fakhri
Rating: **
Towards the end of “Kick”, Salman Khan delivers a punch line – ‘Mein dil mein aata hoon, samaj mein nahi’. This line, which makes it very obvious what should one expect from the film, should have ideally come at the beginning like a statutory warning. Because then you wouldn’t be wondering how can a hero get away in a bicycle when chased by cops in cars, fall off a bridge in a bus and yet manage to walk away without a scratch and rob wearing a mask that hardly conceals his identity. Nevertheless, a true Bhai fan will love “Kick” and is sure to get a kick out of it (or will at least pretend) and all others will find their own reasons (there are plenty) to hate it.
Like how these television advertisements featuring amazing stunts come with a warning right at the bottom (these stunts are performed by experts. Please do not try them at home), a Salman Khan film should come with a warning, preferably on the movie ticket (Bhai ki picture dil mein aata hain, samaj mein nahi). This would make the job of a film critic easier and avoid him or her from doing a postmortem of a Bhai film.
Salman’s “Kick”, an eponymous remake of a Telugu blockbuster, mostly oscillates between a viewer’s brain and heart. It forces you to, for once, not think with your brain but with your heart. When you succeed in doing it, you are likely to watch the movie with a grin on your face.
Bhai doesn’t go shirtless in the film, stands up against a group of men bothering women (as a bhai he’s bound to do that and subsequently deliver a long speech), drives a bus in a chase scene off the road to save a mother and her baby (always seen in Indian films), rides a bike with a car-like behind, robs for the poor and is an adrenaline junkie.
If Ravi Teja made the original work purely with his antics, Salman achieves the same with his stardom. He steals every opportunity from Randeep and Nawaz to shine and uses it to keep himself in the limelight, almost in every frame. But I still loved Nawaz as the baddie. The ease with which he pulled it off explains why he’s one of the finest actors in the industry. Though I felt his maniacal laugh was a turn off after a few times. Bhai has a track record of introducing pretty damsels, but is always paired with actresses who can’t act for nuts and Jacqueline (she’s extremely hot) happens to be one among them.
The movie is high on production values and for a change you don’t see Bhai in the opening frame. It’s Jacqueline. He comes little later. Sajid as producer and director didn’t quite make major changes to the story. There’s absolutely no need to when it has Bhai. Music of “Jai Ho” was a disaster but Himesh gives “Kick” a kick with his soundtrack. And there’s absolutely nothing “Dhoom” about “Kick” except for the chase sequences.
