Gandhari
It seemed to me a tremendous dud. One of those films that begins by promising an intense revenge story, with a desperate mother, a kidnapped daughter and a protagonist forced to move almost blind, but very quickly turns into an accumulation of shouting, blows, coincidences, clumsy explanations and absurd decisions. The idea could have had strength, but the result is a mess that is very hard to defend.
The worst thing is that it does not even work as crude entertainment. A film of this kind does not need to be very refined: it can be exaggerated, violent, direct and emotional, as long as it grabs you somewhere. But here almost everything feels fake. The mother's anguish never really hurts, the investigation does not hook, the twists do not surprise and the violence, when it arrives, feels more like a genre obligation than a true explosion of rage.
Taapsee Pannu tries to lift the material, and she is probably the only thing preventing the whole thing from being even more ridiculous. She has presence and gives herself physically to the role, but the film leaves her trapped in a character written with a hammer. Bani should be a broken, furious mother pushed to the limit, but too often she simply seems like an action figure placed inside a plot that does not know how to justify its own excesses.
The temporary blindness angle, which could have created a special kind of tension, is terribly wasted. Instead of turning that limitation into real suspense, fear, vulnerability or a different way of experiencing danger, the film uses it irregularly and very conveniently. At times it seems hugely important, and at other times it is forgotten as soon as it gets in the way of the action. With that, there is no way to believe anything.
The script is a disaster. Everything is forced in order to take the protagonist from one scene to another, as if piling up obstacles and very bad villains were enough to build intensity. But the intensity never appears because there is no logic, no emotion and no minimum sense of a real world. Supporting characters come and go without weight, the villains are cardboard and each revelation sounds more mechanical than dramatic.
I was also very annoyed by how predictable it is. Very early on you can smell where everything is going, and when the supposed big moments arrive they do not create impact, only fatigue. The film thinks it is increasing the tension, but in reality it is only making the nonsense bigger. There comes a point when it stops mattering who lies, who helps or who betrays, because nothing feels built with real intelligence.
The direction does not help either. Everything has that feel of a streaming thriller made in a hurry, with a lot of noise and very little personality. Some scenes try to be tense, others want to be brutal and others aim to be emotional, but hardly any of them lands cleanly. The film confuses intensity with volume, suffering with shouting and energy with accelerated editing. The result is tiring, not powerful.
The third act, which some may see as the wildest and most satisfying part, seemed to me the confirmation that the film was already beyond repair. Yes, the violence goes up, but the interest does not. When a film reaches its final stretch so badly built, no matter how much blood and fury it throws in, it is already too late. What should feel like catharsis remains noise, blows and cheap exaggeration.
I do not see emotional depth in it either. Motherhood, pain, loss and revenge are themes that can work very well, but here they are treated in such a crude way that they feel like labels pasted onto a bad action film. It is not enough to put a suffering mother on screen for a story to become moving. You have to build that suffering, make it believable, give it weight. Here it is taken for granted and pushed through underlining.
In the end, it remains for me a very bad, clumsy, noisy and forgettable film. Trash with a premise that could have led to something decent and ends up turned into a revenge thriller without nerve, without intelligence and without real emotion. It did not seem failed in an interesting way, nor bad with charm, nor exaggerated in a fun way. It simply seemed like a dud, one of those films you finish with the feeling that nobody fixed the script before starting to shoot.
The worst thing is that it does not even work as crude entertainment. A film of this kind does not need to be very refined: it can be exaggerated, violent, direct and emotional, as long as it grabs you somewhere. But here almost everything feels fake. The mother's anguish never really hurts, the investigation does not hook, the twists do not surprise and the violence, when it arrives, feels more like a genre obligation than a true explosion of rage.
Taapsee Pannu tries to lift the material, and she is probably the only thing preventing the whole thing from being even more ridiculous. She has presence and gives herself physically to the role, but the film leaves her trapped in a character written with a hammer. Bani should be a broken, furious mother pushed to the limit, but too often she simply seems like an action figure placed inside a plot that does not know how to justify its own excesses.
The temporary blindness angle, which could have created a special kind of tension, is terribly wasted. Instead of turning that limitation into real suspense, fear, vulnerability or a different way of experiencing danger, the film uses it irregularly and very conveniently. At times it seems hugely important, and at other times it is forgotten as soon as it gets in the way of the action. With that, there is no way to believe anything.
The script is a disaster. Everything is forced in order to take the protagonist from one scene to another, as if piling up obstacles and very bad villains were enough to build intensity. But the intensity never appears because there is no logic, no emotion and no minimum sense of a real world. Supporting characters come and go without weight, the villains are cardboard and each revelation sounds more mechanical than dramatic.
I was also very annoyed by how predictable it is. Very early on you can smell where everything is going, and when the supposed big moments arrive they do not create impact, only fatigue. The film thinks it is increasing the tension, but in reality it is only making the nonsense bigger. There comes a point when it stops mattering who lies, who helps or who betrays, because nothing feels built with real intelligence.
The direction does not help either. Everything has that feel of a streaming thriller made in a hurry, with a lot of noise and very little personality. Some scenes try to be tense, others want to be brutal and others aim to be emotional, but hardly any of them lands cleanly. The film confuses intensity with volume, suffering with shouting and energy with accelerated editing. The result is tiring, not powerful.
The third act, which some may see as the wildest and most satisfying part, seemed to me the confirmation that the film was already beyond repair. Yes, the violence goes up, but the interest does not. When a film reaches its final stretch so badly built, no matter how much blood and fury it throws in, it is already too late. What should feel like catharsis remains noise, blows and cheap exaggeration.
I do not see emotional depth in it either. Motherhood, pain, loss and revenge are themes that can work very well, but here they are treated in such a crude way that they feel like labels pasted onto a bad action film. It is not enough to put a suffering mother on screen for a story to become moving. You have to build that suffering, make it believable, give it weight. Here it is taken for granted and pushed through underlining.
In the end, it remains for me a very bad, clumsy, noisy and forgettable film. Trash with a premise that could have led to something decent and ends up turned into a revenge thriller without nerve, without intelligence and without real emotion. It did not seem failed in an interesting way, nor bad with charm, nor exaggerated in a fun way. It simply seemed like a dud, one of those films you finish with the feeling that nobody fixed the script before starting to shoot.
Mini Review: It seemed to me a tremendous dud. One of those films that begins by promising an intense revenge story, with a desperate mother, a kidnapped daughter and a protagonist forced to move almost blind, but very quickly turns into an accumulation of shouting, blows, coincidences, clumsy explanations and absurd decisions. The idea could have had strength, but the result is a mess that is very hard to defend. The worst thing is that it does not even...