Vampire Owl :: Didn’t someone say that Riteish Deshmukh was very goood in this movie?

Vampire Bat :: Just a little better than Arjen Robben with a dive, I guess.

Vampire Owl :: If it is better than most of the football actors, we should surely watch it because it will be worthy of many awards.

Vampire Bat :: I heard it was just like I Saw the Devil.

Vampire Owl :: Well, I didn’t see that saw.

Vampire Bat :: Neither did I.

Vampire Owl :: Then I would say that watching this villany is necessary.

Vampire Bat :: As long as he doesn’t bite.

Vampire Owl :: That shouldn’t be a problem as this is not in 3D.

Vampire Bat :: Shraddha Kapoor in 3D was actually too good to be true!

[Enters the movie hall].

What is it about? :: Guru (Sidharth Malhotra) is a former gangster and assassin who has retired from his dangerous life of crime to live with his new found love Aisha (Shraddha Kapoor), but things take a big turn as she is murdered by an unknown assailant who enters her home, uses a screw driver and pushes her through the window. A CBI officer Aditya (Shaad Randhawa) takes charge of the situation being aware of what the former assassin is capable of, but that doesn’t prevent Guru from going after the clues. He first go to his former boss Ceaser (Remo Fernandes), but realizes that he didn’t have anything to do with the same. As he sits in a church looking at the crucifix, he notices a boy coming up and presenting a few of his toys to the statue which involved something from his house. By following the boy, he reaches the place of Rakesh Mahadkar (Riteish Deshmukh) who is the henpecked husband of Sulochana (Aamna Sharif) and an unsuccesful employee who is always scolded both at home and the office. But he doesn’t seem to be capable of anything like that, as he is always the victim, not someone who can harm even a mosquito. But such a visage was never going to confuse a professional killer like Guru, or was it?

The defence of Ek Villain :: The cast remains strong in the movie, especially the male leads, and it is good enough to draw the audience. The fact that it has enough material to work on from the South Korean flick is more of an advantage as not many people have watched that one. The movie successfully establishes a nice environment to work on, right in the beginning, and the point they stop at the interval is pretty nice. The romantic side has its good moments, most of them related to God and otherwise when they are in a song. Even though not really the kind of thing that suits a movie like this, the songs are actually good and are worthy of being in one’s USB device in the car. The cinematography is nice and the world around are nicely captured to the delight of the viewer’s eye. There is not much slow motion used and it is a good thing because there was going to be tendency. Our hero surely has some nice moments in a mental asylum, a hospital and a railway station where he scores in style. The thrills are mostly around our villain though, and the message of good being rewarded and bad being punished, along with the plight of the common man in a society which has nothing for him are nicely shown.

Claws of flaw :: The movie has not much idea about how the suspense is to be maintained and the thrills are to be boosted, as we know the killer too early as well as his motives. The story could have developed better, especially as the material of I Saw the Devil already available and ready to inspire. The path taken by the narrative to go back and forth doesn’t work that well with this one either, as this is the kind of movie which should work when the things to be revealed are not hidden and vice versa. Even the killings are taken care of without too much violence, may be fearing that the family audience will stay away. The director’s earlier venture of Murder 2 could handle the darker shades better, but not this one which tries to be too cute, even cuter than its own heroine. Shraddha Kapoor kind of ruins some significant light moments with a certain kind of overacting which makes one wonder if she is playing a mentally challenged girl, but not all the time for even she has her very small moments. Riteish’s character is also not without its flaws, but it is him who manages to handle it well within the limitations. He could have surely had better dialogues, after all he can do this villain stuff nicely.

Performers of the soul :: Among the star cast, Riteish Deshmukh was the one whose performance stood above the rest, not by much, but enough to be the star of the movie. I did expect some transformation like Vikram in Anniyan on a smaller scale, but that was not to be, but still his different character had moments to remember for the viewers. Sidharth Malhotra was good with his romantic side and just a little behind in the action scenes, but still lacked a bit in energy. Shraddha Kapoor is cute, and seems to think that she is acting in a possible Ashiqui 3, with that hangover which she still seems to show with some Ashiqui 2. I was confident that she will be a lot better in this movie, but it was sad to see that she decided to stick to the stereotype – it does suit her immensely, but not the character she was playing nor the style of the movie. I was particularly impressed with how well Aamna Sharif did so well with her role opposite our bad guy, the first time I was seeing this lady on the screen. Prachi Desai’s item number was pretty much beautiful. Remo Fernandes was okay in the smaller screen presence that he had, and Shaad Randhawa could have surely done nice with some more to do on screen.

Soul exploration :: One major question remains about what lead to the creation of the villain of Ek Villain. If it is about our hero-villain, we can say that it was the childhood situations, but for our real complete villain, it is the wickedness of the so called civilized section of the society who finds it nice to take on the people who are not as fortunate as they are. As said in Animal Farm, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”, and this is the situation that becomes the cause, and this inequality in his own class gives rise to this one serial killer who murders people who used bad words against him or even accuses him of not being good enough, including the situations when he just feels so due to his mood. The need for the words of love from his wife despite her yelling at him all the time becomes his anger which he brings out with the murders rather than being angry at her or anyone else. It is the need to get rid of the frustration which brings the villain to the point of no return, and changes him from a simple man to a serial killer, but as most of the other movies, here too bad deeds never go unpunished, and good deeds have some advantages. The movie does assert the need to be good and not to be abusive or use bad words at others, especially those who struggle to succeed in life.

How it finishes :: Ek Villain had the usual Bollywood things added to an otherwise rough and tough theme, which could have been avoided. There is one villain in every love story as they say, but this is still not a love story, and it surely should not have gone through that path – romance is not always a necessity, as it can always make way for many other things according to the genre and style of the movie. In a more violent and bloody movie, the thing more needed might be a screw driver, one would say. Zinda which released years ago had a better idea about it, which is why we can still afford to watch it with Oldboy of South Korea as well as Oldboy of the United States of America. Murder 2 with similar theme also holds an advantage over this. As Ek Villain had to make it romantic in its base just like the Malayalam movie Anwar did while copying The Traitor from Hollywood, it lost its most important part, which was the generation of fear which had to rise above everything else including romance. But with the success that the movie have managed in places with the exception of this part of India, one has to say that it did work in favour of them even as not for the same as a work. Still, next time may be the can innovate a lot more when coming up with such stuff.

Release date: 27th June 2014
Running time: 130 minutes
Directed by: Mohit Suri
Starring: Sidharth Malhotra, Shraddha Kapoor, Riteish Deshmukh, Aamna Sharif, Kamaal R Khan, Remo Fernandes, Shaad Randhawa, Prachi Desai

@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.