<div><em>Director: Tinu Suresh Desai</em><br /><em>Cast: Akshay Kumar, Ileana D'Cruz, Esha Gupta, Pavan Malhotra, Sachin Khedekar</em><br /><br />Three shots that shook the nation: that is what Rustom, produced by Neeraj Pandey, is purported to be about. But is this dramatization of the 1959 K M Nanavati murder case really all that earth-shaking? The answer is no.<br /><br />Rustom is at best a competently made film. It cannot escape an overwhelming air of inertia generated by a screenplay that plays too safe for its own good.<br /><br />Akshay Kumar, who is in virtually every scene of the film, is in fine form, underplaying his character to near-perfection.<br /><br />However, with the screenplay attuned primarily to project the protagonist, decorated naval officer Rustom Pavri (Akshay Kumar), as a man more sinned against than sinning, the film fails to delve into the intricacies of human relationships and the workings of the investigative and legal systems.<br /><br />In spite of being inspired by a real-life story, screenwriter Vipul K Rawal adopts very filmy means to present the plight of the hero who, in a fit of rage, killed the man with whom his wife was having an affair.<br /><br />Director Tinu Suresh Desai plays along with that strategy, especially in the long courtroom scene in which Rustom takes on the public prosecutor after pleading not guilty.<br /><br />Neither the character of the wife, Cynthia (Ileana D' Cruz), nor that of the wealthy philanderer Vikram Makhija (Arjun Bajwa) are fleshed out beyond the superficial level.<br /><br />While the former is perceived as a woman led astray by loneliness and temptation, the latter is delineated as an incorrigible, unscrupulous womanizer.<br /><br />Rustom has another under-developed character, Vikram's sister Priti Makhija (Esha Gupta), who is in the plot simply to drive the legal battle against the killer.<br /><br />But nothing can sully the image of the naval commander. He is a good husband, a patriot and an honest man who surrenders to the law after pumping three bullets into Vikram.<br /><br />But because of the single-dimension portrayal of the conflicted murderer, Rustom does not develop into a full-fledged examination of love and jealousy on the one hand and crime and punishment on the other.<br /><br />It remains a rather tame thriller about a man in uniform fighting battles on many fronts – personal, legal and national – without ever losing his poise.<br /><br />In order to create an additional aura around Rustom Pavri, the narrative incorporates a strand about kickbacks in a defence deal brokered with the UK by people in high places in the establishment.<br /><br />Given Akshay's solid central performance, Rustom might have been an infinitely more gripping and startling film had it dared to break out of the box and deliver a more nuanced take on one of free India's most sensational murder cases – the last to be tried under the jury system.<br /><br />But for all its flaws, Rustom isn't a complete washout, certainly not for Akshay Kumar fans.</div>
<div><em>Director: Tinu Suresh Desai</em><br /><em>Cast: Akshay Kumar, Ileana D'Cruz, Esha Gupta, Pavan Malhotra, Sachin Khedekar</em><br /><br />Three shots that shook the nation: that is what Rustom, produced by Neeraj Pandey, is purported to be about. But is this dramatization of the 1959 K M Nanavati murder case really all that earth-shaking? The answer is no.<br /><br />Rustom is at best a competently made film. It cannot escape an overwhelming air of inertia generated by a screenplay that plays too safe for its own good.<br /><br />Akshay Kumar, who is in virtually every scene of the film, is in fine form, underplaying his character to near-perfection.<br /><br />However, with the screenplay attuned primarily to project the protagonist, decorated naval officer Rustom Pavri (Akshay Kumar), as a man more sinned against than sinning, the film fails to delve into the intricacies of human relationships and the workings of the investigative and legal systems.<br /><br />In spite of being inspired by a real-life story, screenwriter Vipul K Rawal adopts very filmy means to present the plight of the hero who, in a fit of rage, killed the man with whom his wife was having an affair.<br /><br />Director Tinu Suresh Desai plays along with that strategy, especially in the long courtroom scene in which Rustom takes on the public prosecutor after pleading not guilty.<br /><br />Neither the character of the wife, Cynthia (Ileana D' Cruz), nor that of the wealthy philanderer Vikram Makhija (Arjun Bajwa) are fleshed out beyond the superficial level.<br /><br />While the former is perceived as a woman led astray by loneliness and temptation, the latter is delineated as an incorrigible, unscrupulous womanizer.<br /><br />Rustom has another under-developed character, Vikram's sister Priti Makhija (Esha Gupta), who is in the plot simply to drive the legal battle against the killer.<br /><br />But nothing can sully the image of the naval commander. He is a good husband, a patriot and an honest man who surrenders to the law after pumping three bullets into Vikram.<br /><br />But because of the single-dimension portrayal of the conflicted murderer, Rustom does not develop into a full-fledged examination of love and jealousy on the one hand and crime and punishment on the other.<br /><br />It remains a rather tame thriller about a man in uniform fighting battles on many fronts – personal, legal and national – without ever losing his poise.<br /><br />In order to create an additional aura around Rustom Pavri, the narrative incorporates a strand about kickbacks in a defence deal brokered with the UK by people in high places in the establishment.<br /><br />Given Akshay's solid central performance, Rustom might have been an infinitely more gripping and startling film had it dared to break out of the box and deliver a more nuanced take on one of free India's most sensational murder cases – the last to be tried under the jury system.<br /><br />But for all its flaws, Rustom isn't a complete washout, certainly not for Akshay Kumar fans.</div>
