Kesari Movie Review: Salutation To Sikh Sacrifice

Akshay has played Ishar Singh in the movie and he is the force, which binds the film and his troops together. He is convincing in his role, he leads with great panache and is looking majestic in his Sikh avatar. The actor is looking like a lion and roars like one too. He has some dumdaar dialogues and his dialogue delivery too is impressive. The film has a lot of shortcomings however, Akki’s superstardom hides all the flaws, as he makes everything look convincing.Parineeti Chopra appears like a ghost once in a while in the movie and I really don't understand what did the makers or Pari achieve with this inconsequential character. The rest of the actors have done a good job and the Sikh soldiers are looking extraordinary in their uniforms.The film's plot is awe-inspiring but I wish the makers hadn't dramatized it so much and just stuck to the facts. In a bid to make the audiences emotional, they have stretched the story and made it very melodramatic. It's okay to take cinematic liberties but not to this extent!In one scene, Akshay silences 40-50 Afghan drum beaters by playing his dhol. In another scene, a Sikh soldier starts singing an emotional song while in war formation, with a gun in his hands. Akshay gets surrounded by thousands of Afghans but they only come one-by-one to fight him and when they do come together, the mob standing behind Kumar doesn't attack him. Ughhhh...

Kesari is a period war drama and surprisingly, the film shows no war strategies and director Anurag Singh was also unable to capture any raw emotions. Though he spent the entire first half to establish his characters, they don't have a recall value. The action begins only from the second half and I honestly feel that they didn't need to show Ishar singh as a mahaan insaan, he should have been shown as a great soldier, that's all. The makers have played so safe to be politically correct that it's annoying.Some scenes are very funny and they keep you entertained. The action sequences are awe-inspiring,especially the hand-to-hand combat scenes. Akshay has performed some gravity-defying stunts and the Khiladi makes them all look believable.Anyway, this film is a tribute to the Sikh soldiers, who participated in one of history's greatest last-stand and we salute their valour but I don't think that this film was able to do complete justice to the courage and grit that they displayed in the face of adversity. That said, I would like to thank Akshay and Anurag for bringing this important chapter of history to mainstream cinema as it's important for us to know our heroes.The film has been mounted on a massive scale, the locations are gorgeous and cinematography is outstanding. Music is good but the story, screenplay and the edit could have been better. I feel that Anurag relied more on Akshay's stardom than the story for this movie.

Kesari is not a bad film, only that I expected much more from it.