For a while, the star appearances and action scenes keep things afloat. But after a point, the parallels between this story and the ‘Ramayana’ become too much. The film begins to take itself too seriously and stops being fun.
There have been many adaptations of the Ramayana in Hindi cinema. One category of films deals directly with the epic, like the recent Adi Purush. The other category is more interesting, and it deals with stories “based on” the epic. In the 1980s, we had the Manoj Kumar-starrer Kalyug Aur Ramayan, where a modern-day avatar of Hanuman solves the problems in the family of a man named Dashrath. In the 90s, we had Sooraj Barjatya’s Hum Saath-Saath Hain, in which an insecure stepmother caused the eldest son of an industrial family to be banished, so that her own son could become CEO. In the 2000s, we had Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s Dilli 6, where events in the protagonist’s life are paralleled with events from a neighbourhood staging of Ramlila. In the 2010s, we got Mani Ratnam’s Raavan, a psychological drama that played with the perspective of hero and villain. And now, in Singham Again, we have Rohit Shetty setting his Cop Universe against the backdrop of the Ramayana.
Like in Delhi-6, the events from a Ramlila production are paralleled with the beats of this story. The wife is kidnapped by the equivalent of an asura, and the husband puts together an army to get her back. So when the abduction happens, we see the event cut with the kidnapping of Sita on the Ramlila stage. And so forth. Given that the epic is such a sturdy story (whether you think it is history or mythology), Singham Again has to count as one of Rohit Shetty’s cleanest, most coherent screenplays. There is not a wasted moment, and the energy levels are super-high all the way through. In the “mindless time-pass” sub-genre of films, this is certainly a watchable entry, especially with a parade of stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Deepika Padukone, a wisecracking Ranveer Singh, Tiger Shroff, Akshay Kumar, Jackie Shroff… In the midst of this mayhem, Deepika actually squeezes in a few seconds of pretty fine acting, when facing a woman who’s lost her husband.
Given the “entertain at all cost” agenda, I didn’t particularly mind that the screenplay does not follow up on interesting tangents, like when the Ravana equivalent accuses Rama of “imaandari ka ghamand”. There is a case to be made that Rama was so righteous that this trait almost became a badge he wore with pride – but then, this is not the kind of film that’s going to go there. One of the earliest scenes depicts Kashmiri youths as Indian patriots, and the lines uttered by one of them after a Muslim leader is apprehended is loaded with interpretative possibilities for a political analyst. The young man tells Singham (the Rama character): “Paththar maarnaold-fashioned hai. Yeh naye Bharat ka naya Kashmir hai. Hum sab aap ke saath hain.” Add to this the non-stop, shloka-like recitations in the background score and the mile-high images of gods, and we know things are going to be painted in broad, nationalistic strokes.
That is not a problem. No one goes to a movie like Singham Again expecting… subtlety. And despite this, there are interesting touches in the way this film uses language. On the one hand, we get dialogues from the masala era. When Singham is asked why he became a cop, he says, “Sitaare aasman mein achche lagte hain ya phir sheron ke kandhe par.” On the other hand, we also get a young, modern India where youngsters educate their fathers about what a “situationship” is. Kareena plays a member of the culture ministry and the grand Ramlila is her idea, but she comes across as a modern woman who genuinely believes that the Ramayana is history and not fiction, like her bratty son claims. For a while, this old/new flavour works well, and the star appearances and action scenes keep things afloat.
But after a point, the structure – the parallels between this story and the Ramayana – become too much. The film begins to take itself too seriously and stops being fun. There are some gags from the Ranveer character, but the overall sense we get is that we are in a serious epic-mode adventure rather than in a casually entertaining masala movie. And that becomes a bit of a headache, especially post interval. Also, almost all the high moments, the key characters and their entry scenes, were all given away in the trailer. So that’s a bummer, too. But yeah, Singham Again is watchable in a generic way, and the end credits promise a new entrant to this Cop Universe, from one of my favourite Hindi masala movies of this millennium. If this film makes a ton of money and the next one gets made, I’d be interested in watching what they do with that character!
