Dasvi Review: The Abhishek Bachchan starrer made its debut on digital streaming platforms Netflix and Jio Cinema. It is movie that shoots a message with minimal impact.
The movie dabbles with a good message, to educate and entertain the audience, but Dasvi gets entangled in its own web of confusion and ends up all over the place. Director Tushar Jalota just couldnt convey one simple message, and it loses the narrative way more often than you would expect. The outcome is an hotch potch storytelling that the film un impactful.
Dasvi revolves around life of a showy, uneducatec and corrupt chief minister Ganga Ram Chaudhary (Abhishek Bachchan), who, for his unkown criminal records, including an educational scam, is sent to judicial custody. While he’s imprisoned, his simpleton wife Bimla Devi (Nimrat Kaur) takes over the chief minister’s chair in fictional Hamit Pradesh and begins to savor the power it brings.
Meanwhile, the minister is taken to task inside the jail when a strict and lawful cop Jyoti Deswal (Yami Gautam) is appointed as the new superintendent. It’s after an squable between these two when Jyoti calls Ganga ‘anpadh gawaar’ and he takes up the challenge of completing his Class 10 exam. This comes with a condition that if he fails to clear the exam, he won’t take the chair of CM again. Ganga needs to pass both these tests – inside the jail and outside where his wife has just become quite intent on keeping the chair he asked her to fill for him.
Even though Dasvi has its heart at the right place, it lacks execution and poor writing further weakens it. The fantastic first half is laced with a lot of socio-political satire and comic punches that trigger genuine laughter. But it falls flat in the second half that turns more preachy and looks a tad dragged too.
Dasvi Review: A Good First Half, An Uninspiring Second Half
Dasvi tries hard to engage you but never really seems consistent in the process. The characters are given such a caricaturish look that no matter how hard you try, you don’t believe them for what they are doing.
Writers Suresh Nair and Ritesh Shah don’t really bring any magic with their dialogues or story. At one point, you actually wonder if a politician so addicted to a life of crime have a change of heart overnight? But the film never takes the pain of presenting the essence of transformation. The only thing consistent is the on-point Haryanvi dialect that each character has picked with its nuances. It doesn’t look forced or awkward at any point. The scene in which where Nimrat takes the CM’s oath and reads out her speech is particularly hilarious.
Abhishek Bachchan as the pagdi-tying chief minister is impressive and owns the screen but only to an extent because his character is not backed by impactful writing. It’s a character that is loaded with all the stereotypes of how you would expect an Indian politician to be. That leaves very little scope for Abhishek to shine even when he is well capable of doing so.
Nimrat Kaur is the highlight of the film without doubt. As the housewife-turned-politician, who has now tasted power and fame and is in no mood to let go of her chair and position, she totally nails the part and wins over you. The way her style transforms was a bit much to digest but she lights up the screen with her wit and convincing portrayal of Bimla Devi. As a fiery and strict jailor, Yami Gautam delivers an earnest performance and she definitely deserves an applause for her recent choice of roles that are breaking the clutter. She’s tough and loud in some scenes and restrained in others.
Another thing that doesn’t quite register is the chemistry or equation between Abhishek and Nimrat’s characters. It remains superficial for most of the story and you wish there was some more focus on that part too. Nonetheless, there are some heartwarming scenes between Yami and Abhishek but they fizzle out even before you take notice.
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Dasvi had a strong subject at hand, to focus on the importance of education, especially for our politicians, but in never really translates to what it intents to communicate to the audience.
