Director: Anubhav Sinha, Cast: Shah Rukh Khan, Kareena Kapoor, Arjun Rampal, Master Armaan Verma

BY JYOTHSNA HEGDE

Unless you have been living in a hole, you must know that Shah Rukh Khan’s most groomed venture, Ra.One is now open to public viewing. SRK’s aggressive and incessant marketing on every available media outlet left us no option but to check out his grand fare. So we all did, in huge numbers, it was after all a beckoning from the Badshah himself. Love him or hate him, he makes it impossible to ignore him. So Ra.One raked in the moolah, with some claims of the profligate investment already being recovered. It is astonishing that someone who was willing to put in so much money, passion and time into their dream project would come up with something this hollow at its core; no matter how glossy and glamorous the packaging appears on the outside. 

The basic premise of the story is actually quite endearing. It is about a father dying to connect with his son, quite literally. Either in an attempt to portray an intelligent gene, evoke sympathy or induce stereotypical gimmicks, the dad is presented as a Tamilian, Shekhar Subramanium (SRK) who lives in London with his wife Sonia (Kareena Kapoor) and son Prateek (Armaan Verma). Shekhar designs video games for a living. Being a south Indian apparently implies also being a mumbling idiot who eats spaghetti with yogurt, with bare hands mind you and spurns out an “Ayioo”, “Amma” at regular intervals. So it is established that Shekhar is uncool and his son is not proud of him. In an attempt to please his son, Shekhar creates a game where the villain Ra.One (Random Access. Version 1) is almost invincible. The game takes an ugly turn when Ra.One assumes a life of his own (Tom Wu, Arjun Rampal)and is determined to kill his opponent Lucifer, the game name of Prateek, who was the last to play the game. So the superhero G.One (Good one) emerges out of the game to save Prateek and Sonia. 

I must admit, I like the choice of names for the good versus evil. Ra.One , which can also be read as the Demon of Ramayana, Raavan, representing evil and G.One, which can also be read Jeevan, or life. Such a pity that this much thought process never went into the rest of the movie. 
Some of Anubhav Sinha’s previous works include Cash and Dus. Style certainly is his forte, soul unfortunately, not. Some scenes with panache include the one where G.One single handedly stops a runaway train with no brakes, holds Sonia in his arms as she descends down to earth. The crumbling of aamchi Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus is a visual treat too, as is the intro scene of G.One. One major problem is the lack of a connecting tissue that could bring all this together into something more meaningful. Most of the money seems to have been spent on graphics and special effects, which shows, in parts only. Kareena looks hot as she gyrates to Akon’s catchy numbers, “Chammak Challo” and “Criminal”.

It feels like inspirations were drawn from various western counterparts such as Terminator to name one. Given that the emotional quotient of the movie is supposed to be focused on the father son relation, I wish Anubhav and SRK watched Lion King more closely; the father son moments between Mufasa and Simba were plenty and profound, even for animated characters. 

Anubhav is unsure of the movie’s genre. So he conglomerates action, comedy, drama, sci-fi and everything he could think of. The movie, like Ra.One assumes different identities at different times and neither is successful. Even the jokes are too lame, not fit for adults or kids. There are way too many references to the male private parts, with some scenes like the one at the airport probably not even appropriate for kids. Oh, not to be left behind, like the story and the villain, the hero gets to play multiple roles too, a goofy game programmer who changes appearances to please his kid, and then the chiseled Greek God like G.One. Of course he would, make no mistake SRK is front and center of his creative venture. It is all about him, all throughout. It would be perfectly fine, if the director had a strong script to support this cause. I mean we have loved and nourished the Rahuls and Rajs SRK has played over the years. Aha, but there is a marked difference. Rahuls and Rajs came to us with a heart but G.One only has a H.A.R.T, his power source. Yes, this one lacks heart, especially when you compare it with Robot and even Krissh. 

Maybe SRK managed to squeeze in more technology than his previous counterparts, but he left out something that any superhero must possess - a soul that connects to the audience. SRK should’ve known this better than anyone. C’mon SRK, Chitti had us at his fingertips when he chased a mosquito that hurt his love, now that’s how you make virtual figures come alive. But then again, maybe only Rajni Saar has those special powers! G.One and Ra.One are too full of themselves for any of us to connect on a humane level or root for either. So even as they disappear into their virtual world, all we can do is bid good bye and think about how much better Chitti was and only hope that if SRK does make a sequel, he will remember to add some TLC along with the H.A.R.T to his virtual characters. Let this be a lesson learned that in the end, only dilwaale will get their dulhans!