KGF: Chapter 2 Movie Review: Lukewarm, but too loud

A still from the film

KGF: Chapter 2
Director: Prashanth Neel
U/A: Action
Cast: Yash, Sanjay Dutt
Rating: 2.05/5

My primary grouse from KGF Chapter 2 is that it's an incredibly loud movie. And by that I don't mean how garish it is. It's easier to handle that over the decibels it subjects us to. That said, something about this incredibly noisy film works despite its multiple follies. I daresay, it's the kind of masala movie that Bollywood would dish out in the last decade. Problems galore but dhishoom-dhishoom on point and dialogues that you'll be repeating for months. One can most certainly call this puerile that's what it effectively is. Yash taking on Sanjay Dutt and Raveena Tandon who are all having a ball of a time here, is worth the ticket price.

This movie is textbook masala fitting the template perfectly - angry young man hero, deadly villain, conscientious law keepers, blaring BGM, playing to the gallery performances and formulaic setting. I suspect it is the cinematic language Prashanth Neel brings to the film that Bhuvan Gowda's sharp camerawork only elevates, in this could-have-been banal, formulaic fest. KGF Chapter 2 does better than expected especially in the whistle worthy dialogue department.

Following from the origin story of the last edition, this time around we delve into Rocky's (Yash) growing power and endless enemies. There is a lot of testosterone in the movie - dialogues are brimming with, and brute force is the solution to every social evil. Rocky's robin hood behaviour is convenient, justified by a shoddy back story and designed to strictly service his heroism. This is the kind of film where no one in the cast, crew, production team, writers' room stopped to hero-worship their problematic hero and took a step to critique him. So Rocky's greed continues and we are expected to turn a blind eye, suspend our own belief system and worship him. And it's so slick that you almost want to, until a cringeworthy subplot appears where the hero kidnaps a woman for fun and she happens to fall in love with him eventually. Ouch! Now that's where you went too far, dear movie. Its messed up ideas of morality weakens the impact because years of OTT bingeing and enjoying superlative content has trained our brains to seek better.

Visually, the film is a hit. Some action scenes are beautifully built including one that involves Yash's car chase that plays inventively with play and pause shifts. The scenes where Yash duels it out with Dutt's Adeera are simply sumptuous. To those of you who are taken by such over-the-top boisterous films, KGF Chapter 2 is bang for the buck. But I do advise you to carry some cotton balls. They hint at a Chapter 3 and may your ears survive to hear the tale!