Dhurandhar the revenge starts with young, angry Jaskirat played by Ranveer Singh, farm landscape of Panjab (this is how you spell it. it is not punjab.) and a train ride where he looks at a boy playing with his mom. When he is looking at the kid, he reflects at his own innocence. The look in his eyes is of grief. He is grieving his innocence. In the first part too, when Hamza begun his journey of being the spy, there was a scene of a boy playing with his mother on the bus.
The chapter one is titled burnt memory, and it is going to be a burnt memory for all the viewers.
The anger, passion - what do you even call it. The Jazba - the red emotion in his eyes when he barges into a house with AK47 and rumbles like a storm, “Meri Bhen kithe a? Where is my sister?” He kills dozens of men alone to save his sister who is tied up in an isolated room.
Now this scene, when he enters and sees the sister beaten up, tied on the floor. He feels her pain. I feel her pain. I feel his pain when he feels her pain. Of course my tears rolled down.
Then we get to know, the dozen men that he just killed murdered his father, gang raped and killed his elder sister over a land dispute. When the system did not give him justice - he bought an AK.
To save their sister, who wouldn’t?
Who would choose to face the possibility of dying the second he enters enemy’s house with the gun only to save his sister and take revenge for the death of his father and sister?
Jaskirat Singh Rangi - The hero.
When life throws hell at them - heroes choose to fight. Heroes choose to save. Heroes choose courage.
Now that Jaskirat has saved his sister and the system decided to hang him. There comes a man to save him.
(Go get some snacks. I have a lot to say.)
Ajay Sanyal played by R. Madhvan, gets to know about Jaskirat’s story and decides to recruit him in his master plan to infiltrate Pakistan and stop the terrorism against India. While convincing Jaskirat, he reminds him that a man’s duty is to fight. He also shares the risks, “Yeh Samundar bahut gehra hai, yaha door door tak andhera hai/ This ocean is very deep, there is darkness everywhere you see.” The dialogues don’t hit that hard in English. But the movie did have subtitles.
All this back story was Hamza (Jaskirat as an Indian spy in Pakistan) sharing his story with Alam (another Indian agent who showed Hamza the way into gangs into Layari. I am not gonna go into what Lyari is - go watch the first movie on Netflix).
At the beginning of every chapter, I question why the title name and at the end I see why. I like your style Mr. Dhar. You got me thinking.
Second chapter is Lucifer - obviously dedicated to our villain Major Iqbal played by Arjun Rampal. There is a scene where S.P. (the guy who hates Balochs) kills three innocent young Baloch boys and frames them as terrorist and one of them is a writer - they showed the flashback from first movie. In first part, Rehman visits Balochistan and hugs a young boy and says, “Thodi siyahi baha k dekhlo, kya pta tum balochistan ko azadi dila sako/Spill some ink and see if you can get Balochistan the freedom.” It hits me extra hard when a writer gets killed by a gun. (I think it’s a message for all the pacifiers that there has to be bloodshed to bring justice/get freedom).
The third chapter, ghosts from the past ended at Pinda (childhood friend of Jaskirat who comes to Hamza to buy drugs) calls out, “Tenu ghar di yaad nhi ayi Jassi?/ Didn’t you miss home, Jassi?”
And then there was 15 minutes interval and I couldn’t wait to know how would Hamza deal with this.
In chapter four, Trail by fire there is a face off between Pinda and Jassi/Hamza (total identity crises btw). While this fight, the song Destiny plays - complete banger. It’s devastating when Hamza kills Pinda and Alam takes the blame and Hamza shoots Alam to save him from the torture of ISI. After this, Yalina - the wife finds out that the wife, the love finds out that Hamza is an Indian spy. She points a gun at him. He brings the gun to his forehead. She breaks down and asks him to kill her, “Mohabbat toh ek tarfa thi na/ Love was one sided.” But he doesn’t kill her, obviously coz somehwere he has started loving her too. He explains how he is killing the murderers of the innocent people which is good for both the countries.
She takes a few seconds to process the betrayal as one does when they find out their husband is a spy. And tells him that the enemies are suspicious of his identity. She saves his life so many times. Love saves the hero. Well, love is the most powerful of all - so I dig that detail.
In chapter five, unknown men, it is a blood bath. The scene when he’s about to kill Javed Khanani - the red lights on his face mean business - the revenge - the badla is about to begin. The lion was wild hunter in this chapter.
In the final chapter, we see red on the face of Major Iqbaal when he finds out that Hamza is an Indian Agent. Of course there is a face off between the hero and the villain. It’s a must in a Bollywood action movie.
Angel of Death - Major Iqbal thinks he has Hamza alone in a mosque full of gunmen. The viewers think that too. At that point, I was like - abh toh isse Sunny Deol hi bacha sakta hai/only Sunny Deol can save him now - untill I knew Hamza’s plan. Apparently Hamza got the army of Balochs so they can take revenge for ISI killing their hundreds of children. And then there is a machine gun. (I really don’t know why I get excited over guns. what the fucking conditioning.)
In the face off, when Iqbal had Hamza choked, I was yelling - Uth Shera, fight/ Get up lion, fight!
The face off took them to streets. Bare hands. Both thinking they are fighting for righteousness, duty. But we, the viewers know their intentions by now. We saw their actions. We have decided the judgment. We are rooting for Hamza all the way. And out lion survives. He channels the pain, fuels the courage when Iqbal is trying to humiliate him & the country he is proud of. Pain becomes his eedhan(fuel) and the Babbar Sher (king of lion) is ready to channel…..
drum rolls….
WRATH OF GOD!
Hamza’s face red with blood. Biggest blast of the movie. Blasting a whole train of Kerosene.
And who does he call after the fight?
You guessed it. His love. Yalina. He tells her his real name, Jaskirat because the journey of Hamza is complete.
When he gets captured by ISI, I was doubting if he’d be saved or is he dying. But as the story unfolded, Yalina was the one who told her father about the capture. Of course love was gonna save him. And it had to be love. It’s always love. The OG saviour.
When Hamza is freed, another banger plays - Dil Pe Zakham Khate Hain, Jaan Se Guzarte Hain.
He gets back to India. Takes a train back home. Guess what? A boy smiling and playing with his mom. Classic. After all this fighting for duty, he yearns to be a boy again and sit with his mom.
He sees his mother who does not look at the man walking towards her house. Sees the sister in rhythm of her life with her two boys. Does not go home. He stops and looks back at the fields.
They left it here open to interpretation. There might be another journey or might not be.
Well, I don’t think there will be. At least not for Hamza. For Jaskirat, perhaps.
Woah. Sigh. That was long. But yeah, in short - good movie.
Now lets get into why this movie is art?
a. it makes people think.
b. It is starting conversations. It’s making people express their side of the story, their perspectives. This is what job of art is I think. To express and inspire to express.
Many also say that this movie is not realistic. I say, majority of it was very realistic.
People murdered brutally over land disputes - realistic.
A man ready to fight and face death to save his family - realistic.
The corrupt politician selling drugs - realistic.
People in power killing innocent people in name of religion and patriotism - very realistic.
Limits of violence people will cross to stay in power - very very realistic. Look at the genocides, the wars in the real world.
Now lets talk about the propaganda. There is propaganda. There’s always is. The bias. The stereotype is going to be enforced that Muslims are the villains. It’s going to enforce the religion gap that is already there.
But this also gives us a chance to call out that gap. There is always going to be propaganda from one or the other side.
When you can see through the propaganda, you can call out the reason it is spread for. You can oppose the reason. It’s mainly to spread hate. But you can choose to spread love. Love for all, irrespective of their religion, their background, their agenda and biases.
LOVE for ALL!
XOXO
Arsh Kaur
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