Rippling muscles, hollow tale

Baaghi
Hindi (U/A)
Cast: Tiger Shroff, Shraddha Kapoor, Shifuji Shaurya Bharadwaj, Sudheer Babu
Director: Sabbir Khan

Shraddha Kapoor gets wet everytime it rains. And Tiger Shroff makes it a point to drool over the baarish babe everytime it pours. In between the showers and Kerala tourism promotions, Shroff shows off the only reason why he is in films — his OMG! stunts. And they remain the sole reason to watch Baaghi as well.

Physically, the man is poetry in motion. All his limbs are in sync as he jumps, kicks, slithers, smashes and bulldozes a battalion of baddies. Shraddha also manages some swishes and punches, but is mostly happy rotating around her ever-protective muscleman.
Kerala’s backwaters get ample coverage as the rebel martial arts enthusiast is sent to the state to learn kalaripayattu. Wish the team hired somebody with a better knowledge of the language as well. The movie is sprinkled with terrible Malayalam that makes one familiar with the language cringe. Shroff does plenty of Karate Kid stuff here, with guru (Shifuji Shaurya Bharadwaj) taking him under his wing. He teaches Shroff to balance his body weight on two fingers (the upside-down posture, by the way, forms the introductory shot for the hero).

Shroff’s athletic prowess wins him a lot of whistles. Sorry, his acting chops don’t call for any celebration. He is as wooden as the heavy stumps he uses for practice.

Some villainy comes in the form of Telugu actor Sudheer Babu, who also has the hots for Shraddha Kapoor. The fight for the girl takes both to Bangkok, where the story tapers off into oblivion. In the end, Baaghi is all muscles with no backbone.