Jawan review: Shah Rukh Khan brings anti-establishment cinema to Bollywood

The ordinary man standing up to the system has always been a popular theme in Indian cinema. These films functioned as a form of wish fulfilment for an audience that was frustrated with corrupt politicians and bureaucratic red tape. The Tamil film industry has made several of these movies, with director Shankar being its most successful exponent. 

But Bollywood, in recent years, has taken a different route – best captured by the filmography of a certain Indian-Canadian actor who is now Indian-Bharatiya. Atlee’s Jawan (co-written with S Ramanagirivasan), therefore, arrives as a disruptor in Bollywood though it is overly familiar to this reviewer who hails from the south.

Shah Rukh Khan acts in a template Vijay film, the plot a mish-mash of several Thalapathy starrers such as Kaththi (2014), Theri (2016), Mersal (2017), Sarkar (2018), and Bigil (2019). If each of these films focused on a particular issue  – farmer suicides, corruption in healthcare, and so on – Jawan deals with all of them. Atlee isn’t an original director; but the good thing is that he doesn’t pretend to be one. His secret lies in taking tried and tested material and “massifying” it to an extent that you don’t obsess with its source. So, when SRK bursts through the skies like bhagwan, the swirling dirt bandages on his body making him look like a many-handed god, the cinematic high that the moment offers more than makes up for the bad writing that precedes it.

But who is this bhagwan? In the Atlee formula, flashbacks play a very important role, so the audience has to wait to discover the man’s identity. Fast forward to 30 years later. A hostage situation unfolds on the Mumbai metro, with a certain Vikram Rathore (Shah Rukh Khan) commanding a motley crew of six women. They are from different professions – doctor, teacher, hacker, artist, etc, and they each have a personal reason for being part of this mission. Each of these reasons is a mini Thalapathy padam but Atlee runs out of time to establish all of them. Lehar Khan and Sanya Malhotra get proper coverage of their respective sob stories, and Priyamani gets a hastily edited flashback.

We don’t know why the other three women joined the mission, but we assume it was for similar emotional stories that would make multiple people cry at the same time. Really, I’m not being sarcastic. After each person recounts their story, the camera focuses on the crying faces of the listeners. There is no subtlety in the direction, and why would there be? This is a film that dictates how you should feel about what you are watching every second of the screenplay – with CGI signposts and TV screens when necessary – and is unapologetic about it. This isn’t ‘woke’ cinema, this is old fashioned ‘wake up’ cinema.

SRK is a blast as the unhinged do-gooder who sings old Hindi songs and performs his stardom. The man is an entertainer who knows his job, and he oozes charm in every frame. It gets even better when you understand the metanarrative behind lines like “Bete ko haath lagane se phele”. Later in the film, SRK looks straight at the camera and delivers an impassioned speech that the Tamil audience has heard a gazillion times by now – but in a Hindi film, such an anti-establishment dialogue is startling to say the least. The audience I watched the film with burst into spontaneous applause, as if in whole-hearted agreement with the superstar. I clapped too, and not just out of peer pressure. It is the kind of seeti maar moment that shot-in-studios-only Hindi films have sorely missed in the past few years.

Nayanthara plays Narmada, a senior police officer who looks like a million bucks on a government salary. She gets to do an action sequence but the role is poorly written, and Narmada – for no fault of the actor – emerges as a rather dim-witted cop. She is also saddled with a precocious kid who displays an aunty-level obsession with getting her mummy married. Only slightly less unnerving than mini Anjali from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998). Is Narmada Tamil? Why is there a Tamil song playing when she gets married? Why is she getting married in a lehenga-choli? So many questions.

Vijay Sethupathi overcomes a bad wig and worse characterisation to completely floor us as Kali Gaikwad, the antagonist. How he manages to be funny, menacing and so Vijay Sethupathi at the same time is a mystery. His charisma overshadows even SRK’s, and it’s thanks to him that the film works despite the many holes and complete disregard for reality (hint: there’s a baby shower dance performance in a prison).

Deepika Padukone appears in a cameo and in a plot thread that’s a done-to-death Atlee (pun intended) trope. She’s gorgeous but the sequence is unintentionally hilarious. The action set pieces though are paisa vasool – they’re extravagant and make no sense, thereby allowing you to enjoy them without worrying about anybody’s safety. The interval point is a banger and so is the climax, the rest is timepass material moving towards these highs. 

Anirudh’s background score has elevated many strictly average Tamil films to mass movies, and he packs a punch in Jawan too. At this rate, we may need to impose a ban on Anirudh if we’re to persuade our filmmakers to write better films. He understands the pulse of the mass film like no other composer today, and gives Jawan some much needed ammunition. That the crowd remained seated, cheering for ‘Ramaiya Vastavaiya’ as the credits rolled, is proof of his prowess.

Jawan is (very) old wine in a new bottle for the Tamil audience. It’s a recap of Vijay movies and then some, and the thrill perhaps lies in watching SRK perform to the metre and sensibility of such cinema. But for the Hindi audience, it is as if they have only just discovered TASMAC.

Disclaimer: This review was not paid for or commissioned by anyone associated with the film. Neither TNM nor any of its reviewers have any sort of business relationship with the film’s producers or any other members of its cast and crew.

Sowmya Rajendran writes on gender, culture and cinema. She has written over 25 books, including a nonfiction book on gender for adolescents. She was awarded the Sahitya Akademi’s Bal Sahitya Puraskar for her novel Mayil Will Not Be Quiet in 2015.