Art of killing a good script: My quick take on Akshay’s “Samrat Prithviraj”
I am sorry, I had tried my best to avoid giving my take on this movie for a simple reason that I adore and rever My hero Samrat Prithviraj Chavhan, as his stories of valor and courage still serve as a source of inspiration to many like me. Hence my expectations from this movie were sky high, especially when studios like YRF and talented director/writers like Dr. Chandraprakash Dwivedi are involved. Unfortunately, the end product was a sorry state of affairs.
Last week I had to watch this movie for the second time, this time it was at a request of a family visiting us. It so happened that no sooner than the movie started the five-year-old boy the visiting family jumped up and told his parents, see the ‘harpic’ man (he was referring to Akshay’s harpic advertisement which often flashes on TV). This was a good enough testimony to why the movie failed, reason was simple, Akshay never got into the skin of the character, and maybe he was under the impression that by just wearing different costumes is good enough to fool the audience. The Samrat Prithiviraj was missing from the screen, what one could see was only Akshay Kumar donning a Rajputana mustache. casting this Rowdy Rathor was indeed the top mistake, secondly, makers got confused about whether to make this a love story of Sanyogita and Samrat filled with pomp and celebration or to make a tense historical drama with bloody battles. Unfortunately, they failed to make none.
Here let me commend makers like SLB for his brilliant Bajirao and Padmavat and Om Raut for his Tanhaji, they never deviated from the core of historical facts. The lore of Samrat Prithviraj is so rich and engrossing that a complete web series can be made and presented. Unfortunately, the makers squandered this chance.
No doubt the YRF studio has spent a fortune in creating this movie, they have also hired some good VFX teams, hence the movie looks great in patches because of its great production values. I only wish they had cut down on dance routines and stressed more on action scenes and cast someone else in the lead role.
Anyways it is now available on Amazon Prime, hence if you don't have anything worthwhile to do, then you can watch it, at least you will know how a good story can be badly presented.
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