Shootout at Wadala tells the story of the 70s/80s Mumbai underworld, in particular the first “encounter” which resulted in the killing of gangster Manya Surve (John Abraham). It’s a film chock-full of criminal after criminal (Manoj Bajpai, Sonu Sood, Tusshar Kapoor to name a few), and thrown into the mix are several cops (Anil Kapoor, Mahesh Manjrekar, Ronit Roy) along with Manya’s love interest, Vidya (Kangna Ranaut). The film has already opened huge, but does that mean you should go catch it? Here’s what we think!
While the set up is interesting (I, at least, find the topic hugely fascinating), Shootout at Wadala is one tough film to sit through. The gore is never-ending, and it’s an absolutely crass film in parts. Everything is an attempt to play to the gallery – violence, lewd lines (excessively so), pointless item numbers. To be fair, this will definitely appeal to a certain segment of the audience, who will find the action, cuss words and skin-show complete paisa vasool. But for other people, this will prove difficult to stomach – especially the excess of it all.
Dialogue writer Milap Zaveri churns out some lines that work well – a few are hard-hitting, while others will elicit a laugh (“Be Indian, abuse Indian,” says one guy when he overhears another mouthing off English cuss words). But as it goes on, the dialogues cross the line of intentionally dramatic and venture into the territory of cringe-worthy (“Maafi ke pehle do aksharon mein bhi maa hain“). They end up sounding fake and over-rehearsed, because it’s hard to imagine that anyone actually speaks like that.
What makes it even worse is that there’s no real screenplay or thread holding this film together. The story feels incoherent and disconnected, and more like several violent scenes strung together, with the occasional item song thrown in. But, the film has it’s plus points: for one, it’s slickly edited with some well-shot sequences. For the most part, the actors have done a good job – most noteworthy being John Abraham, who just delivered what is perhaps his best performance till date. He throws himself into the film and it’s clear that his acting skills have improved considerably. (As I write this, I’m watching Dostana on television and the difference is even more apparent.)
Verdict:
Whether you like Shootout at Wadala or not is entirely dependent upon your tastes. I’m inclined to believe that most people would find such incessant gore and vulgarity difficult to handle, but then again, pop in to a single-screen and I bet the whistles will be never-ending.