Finally, Sonakshi Sinha’s first woman-centric flick ‘Akira’ has hit the screens. Directed by AR Murugadoss, the movie is a remake of Tamil film ‘Mouna Guru’. The central character in the Tamil film was a male, but Murugadss has made ‘Akira’ with Sonakshi as the protagonist.
The movie starts off with young Akira who is a daughter of a professor stays in Jodhpur. In front of her, an acid attack takes place to a girl who she knows very well. She decides to stand for right and identifies the culprit, but later she is being attacked and she gets hurt. Her father decides that her daughter should learn self-defence instead of dancing (a fantastic point, which is showed wonderfully in the film). The younger Akira gets into a fight with the local goons and due to this she lands up into remand home. After 14 years, Akira’s brother decides to take her and her mother to Mumbai. Akira starts studying in college, but she still doesn’t be behind to stand for a right thing. On the other hand, there is an ACP (Anurag Kashyap) who is very corrupted. A sting operation is done on him by his own girlfriend Maya (Rai Lakhsmi) and unfortunately the camcorder on which the sting operation as done lands into Akira’s room. ACP’s team kidnaps Akira and plan to kill her, but she fights (some action out here) and saves herself. Now ACP’s team is behind Akira to kill her as now she knows their secret. Will they be able to kill Akira? This forms the rest of the story.
The movie is written by Santha Kumar and he had come up with an interesting concept. However, this interesting concept gets stretchy especially in the second half. The screenplay of the film in the first half is engaging and believe us, there are some edge of the seat moments which impresses us a lot. But, then I was expecting some really interesting and hard-hitting sequences in the second half, however I was disappointed. The write could have made this film a massy entertainer with an interesting concept, but unfortunately the film goes haywire to make it a message oriented movie. At a point you will feel that the movie is over, but no it’s not. It drags a lot towards the end. There are a few things that will make you clueless that why is this thing happening. Like for example, Akira is brave girl and is an expert in hitting the goons, but then there are sequences where she once again becomes the damsel in distress. The movie also has a few technical issues, one of which irritated me in the whole movie was, the mark on Sonakshi’s face. Sometimes the mark was dark and sometimes it was a bit faded. Make up guys need a slap for that.
AR Murugadoss has proved with films like ‘Ghajini’ and ‘Holiday’ that is a fantastic director. Here too he does his work quite well. But, it looks like the director was confused that he has to make a massy film or a film with hard-hitting message (well the message didn’t come out at all). He has tried to put both the things in one film (message as well as masala). Well, there are a few directors who have tried doing that in past, but Murugadoss unfortunately fails here in doing that.
When we talk about actors, it’s Anurag Kashyap who steals the show. He is excellent as the antagonist. We feel he should stick to acting rather than making films. It is good to see a film where Sonakshi Sinha is the main protagonist. She has done action fantastically and has handled the emotional and dramatic sequences wonderfully. The ‘actress’ Sonakshi is here. Konkona Sen Sharma is excellent as the pregnant lady police officer. Her style of walking to her style of talking (sarcastic tone), she has just nailed it. Amit Sadh has nothing to do in the film.
There’s not much scope for the music in the film and that it doesn’t impress. However, the background score is good.
Overall, ‘Akira’ had an interesting concept which goes haywire in narration. If you are a Sonakshi Sinha and Anurag Kashyap fan then it’s a must watch for you.