Brahmāstra Part One: Shiva (2022) by Ayan Mukerji. Amidst its deliberately corny writing and cringe inducing romance, this visually stunning spectacle running high on derivative ambitions does warrant a theatre watch in the biggest screens near you. Despite the fact that there's hardly anything new in terms of conception, Ayan Mukerji's labour of love has indeed succeeded in setting up a cinematic universe that has the potential to grow bigger and better.
It was much easier to understand Ayan's deliberations in the revisit, in terms of the many loose ends being kept open without much clarity, given how it is planned as a trilogy. If the dialogues in the former half reminds you of the lines from a Marvel flick dubbed into Hindi, the ones in the latter half is high on exposition like there's no tomorrow. This first installment could be designed that way to make the masses connect with its world building. The growing footfalls everywhere and the ovation from the audience at the end from where I saw, both times, also suggest that it has clicked with a whole lot of casual audiences.
The shoddy meet cute stretches and Alia Bhatt's terribly underdeveloped character arc —coming from someone who made 'Wake Up Sid' and 'Yeh Jawaani Hai Diwaani'— also left me with a feeling that it might have been intentional. Like what if there's more to Alia's character than meets the eye? Only further installments can throw a light on that. Having said all that, the unreal chemistry between Ranbir and Alia is what makes these hopelessly written portions bearable to a great extent.
Ranbir Kapoor was apt as its energetic yet reluctant protagonist turning into the chosen one and Mouny Roy as Junoon, the antagonist, was effectively menacing in spite of getting such minimal help from its writing department. Hopefully, the sequels will do good on that as well.
Contrary to the worries that its VFX was looking a tad tacky, the action set pieces looked incredibly great on the IMAX screen for a film made with a fraction of what Marvel spends on this department alone. They've followed the template of those Chinese fantasy flicks in terms of its glossy visual language with conviction.
For what it's worth, I can say I would be first in line there for the officially announced sequel given the way it ended promising a cracker of a potential casting coup. Also, I simply loved the way they conceived that superstar cameo and staged it, while giving a bonkers of an easter-egg-like hat tip to one of his classics, which will not be the same anymore. So, yeah, I really liked it and enjoyed it even better in the revisit.
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