Mr. X Review

Rating: 2/5 Stars (Two stars)

Star Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Amyra Dastur,Arunoday Singh, Tanmay Bhatt

Director: Vikram Bhatt

What’s Good: The fact that Bhatts know their audiences so well that they know, in spite of serving them a old done to death script with a invisibility cloak, their fans will watch it. The VFX used for the scenes that have Emraan changing his form are actually done neatly and the kids may enjoy seeing it. (P.S: Do not make the mistake of comparing it to Mr. India)

What’s Bad: An extremely cliched script of Mr. X spoils all the fun and at a point you feel that’s what is invisible in the film, its story. The effects are good but not exceptional for 3D. More than half of the scenes, the 3D part is when the gun is being point at your head! Well you pretend to get scared and then yawn!

Loo break: Can you pee if you are bored? Then just go for it!

Watch or Not?: Mr. X will be your type of film for two reasons – a) If you are a fan of Bhatt films b) You are a fan of Emraan Hashmi. If none of the above, don’t bother spending your money on a 3D movie which has no reason to be 3D.

STORY:

                 Raghuram Rathod (Emraan Hashmi) and his to-be wife Sia Varma (Amyra Dastur) are ATD agents (Anti-terrorist department). The too-much-in love couple after killing a suicide bomber decide to tie the knot so as to secure their future together without the future of losing each other. A day before their wedding, Raghuram and Sia are called upon by their ACP chief Arunoday Singh for a special assignment which calls for the security of the Chief Minister.

Turns out, the assignment is just a trap. Raghuram is wronged by his own department and is forced to assassinate the Chief Minister. After killing the minister, Emraan is killed by the ACP and his men but wait, call it God’s miracle or a scientific experiment, Raghu is still alive but now he is also Mr. X.

Due to the chemicals that react when he is killed in a refinery, the radiation reacts on his body and he can now be visible only in sunlight and blue light. Naturally, he is back to seek revenge from those who wronged him and Arunoday Singh is on his radar. While he is on his journey to vengeance he is not only fighting his enemies but his lady love Sia too, who is under the impression that Raghu is a killer.

Well, what entails is a cat and mouse chase as the department chases Mr. X .

Mr. X Review: Script Analysis

This is a typical Bhatt drama from the start. There are many loopholes in the story and to start with, in the first scene itself, we see our lead female protagonist, who is a anti-terrorist squad member disarming a bomb with bear hands without any equipment. Of course, there are no separate bomb squads to do that!

Interestingly, Raghuram who is a righteous officer suddenly turns rogue only to save his love interest Sia. I mean if all officers were that lovesick, what would have happened to our politicians. Not to mention the dress code for ATD consists of Bharadwaj (Arunoday) sporting crisp formals where as his sub-ordinates, Emraan and Sia move around the office as if dressed for a movie date. Keeping your logic aside, this film is a cliched David vs Goliath tale where the good wins over evil.

The dialogues by Shagufta Rafique are not exceptionally dramatic but not very impressive either. The final scene punch of “Main woh Mr X hoon, jo kanoon tod kar insaaf karega”, does make up for a good end. What is disappointing is that the makers don’t even try to build any kind of suspense, it is predictable from the word go.

Arunoday Singh’s character of Bharadwaj, the lead villain is too sketchy and done-to-death. The love story too is a repetitive one and I am honestly tired of seeing Emraan woo the same kind of women in all films. At a point in one of the love songs, I realized that if it were mute, I would have passed off the same film to be a Jannat or any other Bhatt film with Emraan. It is as if, the writers were relying on Emraan’s invisibility to work more than the content and thus I would say the script of the film is as invisible as Mr. X in the dark.

Mr. X Review: Star Performances

Emraan Hashmi is an actor with a lot of potential and time and again his choices disappoint me. After a disastrous Raja Natwarlal and Ungli, he is back as Mr. X but thanks to the mediocre script, he fails to show any improvement. I would say, he is his usual self and this superhero movie is not gaining him much!

Amyra Dastur as Sia Verma and the female lead in the film is nothing but a typical Bhatt film heroine who looks confused in majority of the frames and in the rest she is trying to prove hard how decent her dialogue delivery is, only to make it clear that she still needs some acting lessons. I would have loved to see someone strong play her role and somehow after Baby, I can imagine Taapsee Pannu doing a great job for this character. Amyra just seems too delicate for her role.

Arunoday Singh as the lead antagonist is oddly fitting. He seems devilish and cold-blooded with his body language but I wish the dialogues given to him were more meaner.

Tanmay Bhatt does a cameo in the film as he plays Emraan’s friend and colleague. We miss seeing Bhatt doing his comic act. I wish he would have cracked a few quirky lines.

Mr. X Review: Direction, Editing and Screenplay

Vikram Bhatt’s penchant for creating sci-fi dramas seems never ending. This time he tries to give us a superhero vigilante drama and sadly that too does not work. One big problem is that Mr. Bhatt forgets to make sure that the script at hand is refined and solid. With a wobbly script like this, he cannot expect the audiences to watch a mushy romantic saga like Aashiqui 2 that is also a superhero film.

Even though the effects are quite good for Bollywood standards, considering that invisibility is the power, the makers should have stayed away from making them similar to those of Hollow man. Paint and fire extinguishers being used to see Mr. X was just far too predictable. Also stretching a movie that is already low on content value over two hours is unacceptable. Towards the end, I had lost all interest in whether Mr. X succeeds at seeking revenge or not. The lighting effects used to show the transformations of Mr.X were good an a particular scene where he moves between shadow and light is a great execution of VFX.

The songs by Ankit Tiwari and Jeet Ganguly are blended well and those who are fans of the music will enjoy it. Also Khamoshiyaan star Gurmeet Singh appears in one of the songs for a performance.

Mr. X Review: The Last Word

Mr. X is just another Bhatt film. Driven by love and revenge, this superhero film is least on the superhero quotient and high on drama. This time for a family audience, I am not sure even kids who have now grown up watching Avengers and X Men would like this. I am going with a 2/5 for this film.

Mr. X Trailer

Mr. X releases on 17th April, 2015.

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Movie 

Mr. X

 

Reviewed by

 

Surabhi Redkar

 

on 

2015-04-17

 

and Rated 

2/5