R[edacted] Rajkumar

I still really want to call this Rambo Rajkumar, because R...Rajkumar is a really dumb title and if nothing else, this movie needs a bad-ass title, because it doesn’t really have that much else going for it. But apparently they got in some sort of hot water about using the name Rambo, so Shahid's character became Romeo Rajkumar and the title became. . . that. As far as the movie itself, I’m not sure I was disappointed, since it was a timepass in the very best sense of the word. But, well, I’m not sure it’s worth watching more than once.

The beginning was promising. Shahid Kapoor (as the titular whatever-you-want-to-call-him Rajkumar) beats people up and dances in fantastic Prabhudeva fashion. We first meet Chanda (Sonakshi Sinha) breaking bottles over the heads of some obnoxious men, and Angry Sonakshi channels Madhuri from Beta in a great way. Sadly, we don’t see much more of that, although Indignant Sonakshi (as Rajkumar stalks Chanda) is almost as good.

Sonu Sood gets to be both menacing and hilarious as Shivraj. He also gets a pretty bitching moustache. (Shahid’s manly stubble, though, is definitely the facial hair of the year, as SRK’s was of 2012.)

“Main paise ke liye kuch bhi kar sakta hoon. TOH SOCH. . .  main apne pyaar ke liye kya kya karunga.” (I can do anything for money, so just think what I can do for love)

So I did enjoy the movie. And it really seemed like it had all the elements of a funny, Southie-ish masala film, but the script just didn’t quite work for me. It’s disappointing, because Prabhudeva + Shahid + Sonakshi + Sonu should equal AWESOME and somehow do not. You will notice I have said very little about the plot. There isn’t much. There are gangs and bad guys and people beating each other up and Sonakshi being very pretty and not much else.

The tone gets really weird in places, too. You have Chanda and Rajkumar scheming to make Shivraj look like an idiot (And indeed it’s pretty hilarious to see Sonu and his mustache trying to hip-hop dance in baggy cargo shorts.) as if they’re dealing with some buffoon who will easily give way for Rajkumar and Chanda to be together, but they’re dealing with Shivraj, who repeatedly tells Rajkumar that if he wins Chanda, he’ll rape her and make him watch. (And by “wins” he means that his gang and Chanda’s uncle’s gang will beat Rajkumar up until he’s mostly dead and she’s forced to marry Shivraj instead.)

Could we have a little more of this, please?

I had the same problems with the script’s treatment of women that I did with Wanted. Chanda starts off beating men with glass bottles and indignantly confronting Rajkumar, and by the end she’s standing helplessly in her bridal lehenga while the villain battles the hero pretty much to death.* It’s not only that she has no agency in the story, but it just seems to be a very shitty thing in general to be a woman in a Prabhudeva movie. There’s a completely random and unnecessary joke of implied rape in a police station; the cop has to stop and zip up to take a phone call. Excuse me if I laugh until I puke. I mean, yes, all the horrible people get killed in nasty ways by the end but I'd rather just start out with my stories being less rapey in the first place, thank you very much.

*And really, I just watched Chennai Express, can’t we be done with that?

But for all of that, it was full of color and snappy dialogues and delightful dancing along with as many well-choreographed fights scenes as you might want, so I’m not at all sorry I spent the $10 on it.