‘Baazaar’ is manda

Nonika Singh

The manoeuvrings of stock market and the insider games we have seen in rather impressive The Wolf of the Wall Street powered by Leonardo DiCaprio’s brilliant act. The real drama of insider trading unfolded before us in the rise and fall of Harshad Mehta. Baazaar too moves into the same realm, the bullish market and the unscrupulous bulls riding high on money and greed. One such business tycoon is Shakun Kothari, a conniving Gujarati, for whom money is no less than god. Dhanda hai, the favourite Gujarati word that justifies their business acumen hangs heavy. It is the raison d'être of Shakun’s life and motto through which his business thrives. Everything is fair in the trade market… and thus he builds his empire by manipulating stocks.

Till the interval the film has you invested in his story as well as of Rizwan Ahmed with whom anyway the drama begins. A small town boy from Allahabad, he idolises Shakun like crazy. Even though the manner in which he finds his entry into the big world of Dalal Street is contrived, you do pay attention. For the promise of how they would become each other’s nemesis is indeed tantalising. 

Post interval the story begins to search for the moral core and flounders. The other undoing of the film is that it rests too heavily on the shoulders of the newbie Rohan Mehra, the son of the late actor Vinod Mehra. Indeed, he makes a promising debut. He could well be a marathon runner if not a sprinter; an 

analogy that film impresses upon and is what helps you ultimately survive in the volatile world of shares. With his dimpled looks he is charming and earnest. But he lacks the cutting edge; the bhookh as Shakun tells us separates a winner from a loser. Besides, pitting him against seasoned actors such as Saif Ali Khan is a bit unfair. Khan, however, carries his part and even when reiterating cheesy lines like

‘paisa bhagwan se kum nahi’ is convincing. Mera paas maths hai tumhare pass emotion, he tells his protégé. And the shishya reminds him later on duniya emotion pe chalti hai. Alas, the film tries too hard to touch base with our emotions and forsakes its advantage. 

Love angle; Radhika Apte playing a broker agent as well as Rizwan’s love interest is more of a distraction. Chitranagda Singh as Shakun’s wife gets to mouth some heavy-duty dialogues on how female elephant ditches its male counterpart to drive home a message and also leaves behind a clue. Both she and Apte are relevant to the script but can’t elevate the film. 

What works are the devious designs of ruthless Shakun and Saif’s expressions matching the guile of the character. If only, the director’s prime focus had been him and not the unnecessary songs and good and 

bad binary, this could have been a high on adrenaline edgy experience. Sadly, the director gets its calculations wrong. Still the movies passes muster and is passable fare. Only even compelling Saif can’t transform it into a Wolf of the Dalal Street. 

nonikasingh@tribunemail.com