Sonchiriya opens with the camera zooming in on a dead snake with flies buzzing around its bloodied body. It stays static for a couple of minutes while the viewer is forced to flinch. A group of Chambal dacoits approach the snake with fear, one of them even asking the lot to turn back.
The dead snake is almost a bad omen of things to come. But the gang leader, with some trepidation, uses the barrel of his gun to pick up the snake’s lifeless body and take it to a corner. He then says a little prayer and they slowly carry on. The ravines spread out and suffocatingly close in, simultaneously.
More Than A Dacoit Movie
From Sholay and Bandit Queen to the more recent Pan Singh Tomar, dacoits and their daredevilry have found a haloed space in Bollywood.
Director Abhishek Chaubey along with writer Sudip Sharma at the outset seem to be conjuring up yet another familiar universe about outlaws and their head-on collision with authority. But a few minutes into the film, it becomes apparent that there are multiple layers that it seeks to examine.
There is already an air of despondency that hangs heavy. The crackling sound from an old radio announces the Emergency while the fugitives are on the run. A foreboding tone sets in as Man Singh (Manoj Bajpayee) and his men acquiesce to their dwindled relevance. These men are not just after some bounty or considerable loot, but with the end near, they each must face up to their demons and seek salvation.
Manoj Bajpayee, here in a special appearance, mines the weariness of the character’s age and experience beautifully.
In just a couple of scenes, he leaves a lasting impact. It’s then left to his loyal lieutenants Lakhna (Sushant Singh Rajput) and Vakil (Ranvir Shorey) to keep us invested.
Both Sushant Singh and Ranvir Shorey display a credible potency but the patchy narrative gives it a stagnant feel.
The setup is undoubtedly ambitious. There is a lot that this film is trying to tell. The class and caste barriers, the moral code even amongst the fugitives, the whole feminist angle where one character even goes on to say that the class hierarchy is for men. Women have a different caste altogether, the lowest and far removed.
Bhumi Pednekar and a young girl join these dacoits and in a way become their conscience keepers. Ashutosh Rana plays a police officer with a personal agenda who is fully immersed in his mission to capture the “baaghi”. But both of them have very limited scope, tethered to the monotonous graph of their single-tone characters.
Inspite of some solid performances and Anuj Rakesh Dhawan’s impressive cinematography, Sonchiriya remains static and never really comes together. It moves up to a point and stagnates. Somewhere with multiple narratives vying for space, the film comes undone.
2.5 Quints out of 5.
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