Pushkar and Gayatri adapt their 2017 Tamil film Vikram Vedha, shifting the action from Chennai to Lucknow while remaining loyal to the original. They create a rare massy entertainer that packs a message while also keeping the viewer guessing, as its eponymous protagonists engage in a feverish game of cat ‘n’ mouse, starting off on opposite ends but gradually finding themselves sliding over to the other’s side until the line between good and evil blurs.
The idea that cops and criminals are two sides of the same coin has been explored extensively in film. Heat, directed by Michael Mann and starring Al Pacino and Robert De Niro, is a brilliant examination of how a cop’s life and career can be more messed up than a gangster’s. Such is the case with Vikram, in which Saif Ali Khan takes over the role previously performed by R. Madhavan.
In the original, R. Madhavan plays an encounter specialist who is parachuted into a special task force in Lucknow with the single-minded purpose of eliminating a dreaded criminal named Vedha, with Hrithik Roshan playing the role played by Vijay Sethupathi in the Tamil version like a second skin.
Vikram Vedha begins with an encounter meticulously organized by Vikram and his motley gang of cops, including close friend Abbas (Satyadeep Misra). While some of his comrades are hesitant to take out defenseless men, Vikram has no such reservations.
He emphasizes, “We are the good ones,” and maintains that he sleeps easily at night since he knows he has never killed an innocent person. Until the day Vedha walks into the police station, surrenders, and continues to tell Vikram a story that slowly but steadily begins to undermine the latter’s predetermined conceptions of good and wrong.
Dilemmas – ethical, moral, and social — are central to Vikram Vedha. A big part of it stems from the mythological story of Vikram and Betal, in which the ghost Betal, who represents evil, always succeeds in putting King Vikram in a moral quandary after giving him a story that contradicts the ethical mores the monarch has always believed in.
Vikram’s moral quandary is not restricted to his workplace in Vikram Vedha… it also penetrates into his relationship with his wife — Radhika Apte plays Priya, like Shraddha Srinath in the original — who, as a lawyer, defends Vedha.
Vikram Vedha, an action picture plotted in the form of a whodunit, manages to keep the viewer involved despite its running period of 160 minutes since it isn’t simply a gangster drama. Yes, gangster film cliches abound, as they did in the original, but one can easily look beyond that because this is a genre-bending film that flawlessly integrates heavy-duty action with philosophical dialogues.
Even as they continue to meet face to face and Vedha continues to tell Vikram one narrative after another, the viewer is taken on a rollercoaster filled with mystery and excitement, where masks are peeled off and loyalties are questioned.
Despite its dark premise, Vikram Vedha is a unique cop-vs-criminal film with compelling frames. Whether it’s Vikram and Vedha dancing in the rain or an action sequence in a field with slo-mo kicks and punches choreographed to the evergreen Mukesh hit Kisi ki muskurahaton pe ho nisar.
The architecture and, more crucially, the street food of Lucknow provide Vikram Vedha a visual texture that benefits not only the cameraman but also the audience.
Also read: Hush Hush: sharp performances, but the plot lacked nuance and depth.
P.S. Not only to Vinod’s frames but also to the plot.
Vijay Sethupathi didn’t need to be a hero even when he was delivering crowd-pleasing remarks. Casting Hrithik Roshan in the same role implies that the actor must dominate every frame that he is in. If Sethupathi’s performance was tempered by the pretense of a simpleton pulling off the sly and sarcastic, Hrithik’s larger-than-life image necessitates that he strolls across the screen with as much gusto as he does his hallmark fluid motions.
Alcoholia, a mundane song rendered watchable only by Hrithik’s energy and gestures, is a wonderful example of what he contributes to Vedha – darkness but also a sense of humor, casual cruelty but also a teasing tone. The greys in his hair and scruffy beard, which first appeared in War three years ago, contribute to his enchantment and charisma.
It’s to Saif Ali Khan’s credit, as it was to Madhavan’s in the original, that he manages to provide meat and meaning to a less spectacular role. Vikram’s growing moral quandary is wonderfully expressed by the creases on Saif’s brow. When they first meet, Vikram is dressed in white, and Vedha is dressed in black.
The two’s dazzling debate about dharma and dharam sankat, moh, and maryada over a table remains one of the film’s most memorable moments. By the end of the film, Vikram is wearing grey, symbolizing a shift in his mindset and, eventually, action.
“The devil is in the details,” Vikram remarks in the film at one point. Pushkar and Gayatri express this throughout Vikram Vedha, where no detail provided is a throwaway phrase, no interaction is merely a filler… everything is designed to add up in the end. That it does.
CS Sam’s throbbing score goes, ‘Yeh kaala kya yeh safed kya, dono mein bhed kya,’ with the ‘Vedha theme,’ copied from the original, staying with you long after the curtains come down.
That money shot of Vikram and Vedha rushing together and spraying shots at a common enemy, one now indistinguishable from the other, works as well. As the saying goes, there is always some good in the terrible and some bad in the good.
