Mission: Lost

Jasmine Singh

Jiska Kaam usi ko saaje, an old saying throws away a tiny-yet important lesson of a sticking to the field of work you are good in and at! Yo Yo Honey Singh, singing, music, rapping...you are definitely good at it. Zorawar... acting? Singing is a better idea!

Directed by Vinnil Markan, Punjabi film Zorawar that was being touted as Yo Yo Honey Singh’s comeback in a ‘different’ kind of role, is like a mission that lost track within two minutes of its launch, a mission that moved on a snail pace only to gather speed towards the last leg, a mission that did not justified its being there, a mission that ended after a painful journey of three hours. 

Coming back to the word different, Zorawar being a different film, and Honey’s role being different...By now, we all know (especially the movie buffs) know that the word different stands for either ‘same, or boring or confused’. Zorawar justifies all the three different meanings of being different. 

The films story written by Sagar Pandya is also like a ‘mission’, but this one’s lost in Durban! The director, Vinnil Markan has unduly stretched certain scenes in the film, and leaving many of them unjustified and unanswered, which leaves you with one question-  What’s happening Yo (we mean bro)!’. 

The film picks pace only about 10 minutes after the second half. You haven’t still gone far when you realise what the director has done! He has in fact given a balanced treatment to both the halves-both have been stretched to boredom! That feeling of pace in the second half is nothing but mirage. You have started hallucinating! 

Now, if you want to get over this hallucination, you need to ask yourself a few questions. 

(This exercise will keep you from going into a deep slumber). One, could ask how was Pawan Malhotra in the Punjab chapter of the film? Pawan Malhotra who is apparently following Mukul Dev to Durban, how come is now seen as an Intelligence kind of man in Durban. Two, who is Amit Behl (Angad) in the film. Why did he save Mukul’s life? 

Now for the actors in the film, or let’s say, a film which has a music a video feel to it. Yo Yo Honey Singh can act, as we said, singing is a better idea! Mukul Dev has gone a full-length to justify his character. Achint Kaur, who plays Honey’s mother in Zorawar is good. She nothing like the Punjabi mothers we are used to watching in Punjabi films. Pawan Malhotra acts really well, his acting in Zorawar reminds us of his work in the Punjabi film Punjab 1984, same–to-same. Is this good or bad? Bani Judge, an undercover agent- cum- lady don, it’s interesting to see this new character, even though she gets to say 3-4 dialogues. Amit Behl, a don who wears leather outfit throughout the film, exposing some good amount of fat! Parul Gulati, we first see her in the first half, she goes missing completely later, reappears late in the second half and stays for a song and the climax! 

The songs in the film are a typical Honey Singh ishtyle. Both romantic and party songs have the same feel and beat. And it is the beat of a mission that couldn’t end on a winning note!