‘Pushpa 2: The Rule’ Review: Allu Arjun-Starrer Shows Sometimes Less Is More
'Pushpa: The Rule', starring Allu Arjun, hit theatres on 5 December.
advertisement
In a particularly moving scene, Pushpa (Allu Arjun) breaks down in his mother’s arms as the women of the house surround him and his friends and followers flank them on both sides. This scene is enough to emphasise what sets Pushpa apart from other ‘massy’ heroes – he is vulnerable and relatable even when he is larger-than-life. And that is a major reason for Pushpa: The Rise’s success.
Director Sukumar builds a brilliant legend-making narrative for Pushpa – he is not a ‘flower’, he is a ‘wildfire’ – and the sequel Pushpa: The Rule’s first half rides on that appeal. Pushpa, now at the head of the red sandalwood smuggling empire, has multiple adversaries to deal with; the most prominent being SP Bhanwar Singh Shekhawat (Fahadh Faasil). Shekhawat, still nursing the wounds of his humiliation, has infiltrated the ‘syndicate’ with no actual plan in sight.
Allu Arjun in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
Pushpa never shies away from admitting that almost all the senseless violence in the film could have been avoided if not for male ego and, more often than not, it’s the women in the film who pay the price. While this look into action and consequence in a patriarchal world isn’t too far off from reality, the film doesn’t balance it out well. The trope of subjecting women to sexual violence to make a half-baked point about consent and a misplaced argument about ‘honour’ just to give the ‘hero’ a chance to rage is as old as it is frustrating.
On the other hand, it’s refreshing to see a pan-Indian movie hero be a ‘wife guy’ – Pushpa’s philosophy is simple, “She’s my wife. I will listen to her.” And while this sets up Pushpa and Srivalli’s (Rashmika Mandanna) married life well, they still very much exist in the same societal confines they aim to challenge.
We only see Srivalli either cooking in the kitchen or gushing over her husband (except one powerful monologue) and if not for Mandanna’s performance, she would have been as forgettable as ‘heroines’ in these massy films tend to be. It bodes well that the film gives Srivalli as much sexual agency as it gives Pushpa but when the prevalence of the male gaze becomes glaringly obvious, you’re back at square one. There are some moments that do work – Pushpa spends an extended sequence fighting goons off in a saree for instance; his trademark watch replaced by bangles. The scenes between Pushpa and Srivalli could easily have felt cringe worthy but the chemistry between the actors saves them.
Allu Arjun and Rashmika Mandanna in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
Even as the clash between Pushpa and Shekhawat continues, he still has his family to deal with – his step-siblings still don’t accept him and his mother as their own. Pushpa 1 used this ‘othering’ to highlight a conversation about classism (and in subtext, about caste) and the second film continues to pull on the thread of Pushpa’s ‘identity’. What you’ve read so far would ideally be enough to make a film out of but Sukumar isn’t known for subtlety – instead, the filmmaker likes to see how high the stakes can go. So he introduces a Japanese client trying to con Pushpa and a businessman from Dubai with a lucrative deal, and a powerful politician with some tricks up his sleeve. In all this, the story gets lost.
So instead of a film effectively capitalising on its prequel’s success to capture the same mass appeal that it did, Pushpa 2 quickly unravels into a film that’s trying to do too much. It’s almost overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time. Action sequences that seemed impressive earlier are driven up a notch, rendering them nonsensical (there is a time and a place for a vampire saga and Pushpa 2 was not it).
Fahadh Faasil in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
One can’t fault Pushpa 2 for being ambitious – why wouldn’t the makers try to make something bigger and better? But in doing so, they do what most sequel makers tend to do – they only increase the scale and forget to pay attention to the roots. Instead, it’s clear that the Allu Arjun-starrer is pandering to fans. Once you add that to the absence of a strong screenplay, the level of suspension of disbelief that is expected of you as an audience becomes cumbersome.
That is not to say that the film isn’t fun. Allu Arjun has lived with this character for years and that commitment to the role is obvious – a stellar performance. He patches up the holes in the script and his sheer charisma and swagger make up for a lot of the film’s flaws. Even when he’s engaged in a sequence that makes you want to throw your head into your hands, he delivers. Arjun carries Pushpa with a mix of swag and raw vulnerability that makes the character difficult to discount, no matter what.
Allu Arjun in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
In a sequence where Pushpa struggles with how he will be perceived when he slightly lets go off the upper hand, we truly get to see how a life of being sidelined and ridiculed has shaped his relationship with power. If he can't look himself in the eye, how will anyone respect him? If he becomes predictable, will he be able to hold on to the spot he has clawed his way up to? In the moments where we get a peek into Pushpa's psyche, the film picks up, dragging you back into the magic of Pushpa's universe.
The chemistry between Pushpa and Shekhawat only adds to the fire – Faasil as Shekhawat is hilarious when he has to be and yet there are shades of something darker. Sometimes you can’t help but see this character as a ticking time bomb; only the ticker is unreliable so you never know how he might react. It’s obvious that this back-and-forth with Pushpa has taken a toll on his psyche and we begin to see cracks form in his bravado – he is scared and he is embarrassed. And on his other side is a man who seems to fear nothing.
Their equation always seems to hang somewhere between hatred and something that feels too much like friendship. Pushpa and Shekhawat are in a situationship, to be fair.
Allu Arjun in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
But Shekhawat, like many other characters, only exists to serve the hero’s journey which, in an ironic way, makes it harder for you to invest in the journey. Without a worthy villain who truly puts the film’s stakes into perspective, the hero ends up being just that – a character. He does not morph into a ‘legend’. And Pushpa is meant to be a legend, a brand. Consequentially, the shades of morality that existed in Pushpa’s character in the prequel fade into the background – his is not a character one should unequivocally root for but this film makes you feel like he is.
The saving grace is that the film swiftly wades through its runtime and the meticulous frames crafted by DOP Miroslaw Kuba Brożek make the film a visually arresting experience. The Gagamma Thanlli jatara sequence is mounted and executed brilliantly – the scene, for lack of a better word, oozes power and barely suppressed rage. For a brief moment you are transported back to what made ‘Pushpa’ a national spectacle despite the smaller scale.
Allu Arjun and Rashmika Mandanna in a still from Pushpa: The Rule.
(Photo Courtesy: YouTube)
Devi Sri Prasad’s (DSP) background score along with Chandrabose’s lyrics breathe life into some of the film’s lesser scenes and yet, the action choreography and editing don’t match up to the audio technical prowess. The film is clearly creaking under the pressure of the audience’s expectations while trying to bring Sukumar’s large-scale vision to life and that mishmash results in a film that feels incomplete. By the time the Pushpa 3 announcement fills the screen you can’t help but wonder if this is a film that could’ve just ended with Pushpa 1.