Just watched the Movie Akira today, a good 2 weeks post its release. Had heard mixed reviews about the movie, but looking at the trailers of the movie, I had made up my mind to watch this movie. The movie begins from the backdrop of the city Jodhpur . A dutiful teacher, tries to imbibe values of courage & self righteousness among his students & daughter. Set against the poignant backdrop of "acid attacks" against women in the city & how all these incidents move the young Akira & her father, who decides to get her trained in self defence & how young Akira stands up against the Goons in her very childhood. In the ensuing scuffle, she badly injures the goons & hence is send to a Child remand home
Cut to her adulthood & she is forced to move to Mumbai with her brothers family. She decides to stay in a College Hostel . How she gets embroiled & entangled in a controversy involving a "HandyCam" that was supposed to be used to blackmail, ACP Rane (Played by Anurag Kashyap) & how Akira fights back to prove her innocence & save her life against the Corrupt & debauch policemen who are out to destroy her, forms the crux of the Story
Performances
Sonakshi Sinha, has taken a big risk,playing such an action oriented character. But for me & her fans, the risk pretty much pays off. Sonakshi has delivered one of the most restrained, subtle & underrated performances in such an action packed movie . The traumatised childhood in remand home, the pain & frustration of losing her 3 academic years & the resolve to stand against anything wrong, has been potrayed by Sonakshi in a very simple & lucid manner . She has managed to avoid histrionics & draw greatly from her innermost emotions & goes well beyond the surface of such a strong character. The action sequences have an innate grace about them & you feel a strong woman , an ordinary mortal girl fighting for her life & her right & not a Super girl or a superwoman. That's where I would laud Sonakshi, for the fact that Akira, has been potrayed as an ordinary girl with her set of fears & challenges & not as a Superwoman, which very easily could have been the case, had the characterisation not been kept tight
Anurag Kashyap as ACP Raane, is highly convincing as the menacing, mean & unscrupulous Cop, who abuses & misuses his power, with such pride & confidence. Kashyap has acted in movies earlier as well ( Tigmashu Dhulias Shagird, saw him playing an UP Don, Raja Bhaiya) & one wonders, why doesn't he don the actors hat more often . Bollywood could well have a rustic, mean, hungry & devilish, character actor readily available
Konkona Sen Sharma, as an Honest & Upright Cop, who is on a Parallel Investigation case, which has its tracks linked with Akiras & ACP Raanes case. Konkona is good as usual, & delivers yet another effortless & smooth performance
All in All, Akira, is a movie that leaves you with some questions ... The scene in the movie where Acid attack victims are seen consoling each other, another scene, in which the acid attack victim returns home & sees her disfigured face & her once beautiful photograph, is heart wrenching.. I just checked some statistics & found that majority of acid attack cases involved spurned lovers for reasons of revenge & giving a punishment to the girl for refusing... What a shameful society we are turning out to be . Maximum cases in 2014 have been reported from UP (again a very typical Patriarchal society with Male chauvinism as the order of life) ...Not sure how swift our state & central governments will move on this issue, but the movie definitely raises a point, that Women need to take their safety in their own hands & stand up to fight for their right, even if it means use of force & violence
Cut to her adulthood & she is forced to move to Mumbai with her brothers family. She decides to stay in a College Hostel . How she gets embroiled & entangled in a controversy involving a "HandyCam" that was supposed to be used to blackmail, ACP Rane (Played by Anurag Kashyap) & how Akira fights back to prove her innocence & save her life against the Corrupt & debauch policemen who are out to destroy her, forms the crux of the Story
Performances
Sonakshi Sinha, has taken a big risk,playing such an action oriented character. But for me & her fans, the risk pretty much pays off. Sonakshi has delivered one of the most restrained, subtle & underrated performances in such an action packed movie . The traumatised childhood in remand home, the pain & frustration of losing her 3 academic years & the resolve to stand against anything wrong, has been potrayed by Sonakshi in a very simple & lucid manner . She has managed to avoid histrionics & draw greatly from her innermost emotions & goes well beyond the surface of such a strong character. The action sequences have an innate grace about them & you feel a strong woman , an ordinary mortal girl fighting for her life & her right & not a Super girl or a superwoman. That's where I would laud Sonakshi, for the fact that Akira, has been potrayed as an ordinary girl with her set of fears & challenges & not as a Superwoman, which very easily could have been the case, had the characterisation not been kept tight
Anurag Kashyap as ACP Raane, is highly convincing as the menacing, mean & unscrupulous Cop, who abuses & misuses his power, with such pride & confidence. Kashyap has acted in movies earlier as well ( Tigmashu Dhulias Shagird, saw him playing an UP Don, Raja Bhaiya) & one wonders, why doesn't he don the actors hat more often . Bollywood could well have a rustic, mean, hungry & devilish, character actor readily available
Konkona Sen Sharma, as an Honest & Upright Cop, who is on a Parallel Investigation case, which has its tracks linked with Akiras & ACP Raanes case. Konkona is good as usual, & delivers yet another effortless & smooth performance
All in All, Akira, is a movie that leaves you with some questions ... The scene in the movie where Acid attack victims are seen consoling each other, another scene, in which the acid attack victim returns home & sees her disfigured face & her once beautiful photograph, is heart wrenching.. I just checked some statistics & found that majority of acid attack cases involved spurned lovers for reasons of revenge & giving a punishment to the girl for refusing... What a shameful society we are turning out to be . Maximum cases in 2014 have been reported from UP (again a very typical Patriarchal society with Male chauvinism as the order of life) ...Not sure how swift our state & central governments will move on this issue, but the movie definitely raises a point, that Women need to take their safety in their own hands & stand up to fight for their right, even if it means use of force & violence
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