Kidnap Review

If you want to learn how not to make a movie perhaps you should see Kidnap. Or perhaps if you want to have a good laugh at the film, you should see Kidnap. It is indeed a very funny movie, although the director, Sanjay Gadhvi, intended it to be a dark movie, a thriller. But alas, the result is comic.

There is this scene where the kidnapped girl Sonia (Minissha Lamba) begs her kidnapper Kabir (Imran Khan) to grant her just one wish. After all she has been imprisoned in a hellhole (she thinks, but to me looks more like a bachelor’s very comfortable pad fitted with bathtub) and that too with limited water supply. She promises Kabir that she will listen to everything he says and do whatever he wants if he will grant her one wish! We all wait with bated breath to hear what it is…she says: “Give me enough water to have a bath”!
And no, this isn’t a joke. It’s a serious request, and the kidnapper purses his lips, pondering whether or not to grant her wish!

This movie is not just about a kidnap. It’s also about Minissha’s body. Clearly she has worked hard  to get the hour glass figure which the director takes pains to show at every opportunity. Sonia’s kidnapper Kabir has stocked his den with the most expensive and skimpy designer outfits specially bought for his victim. So while he is not busy cooking for her, he is busy watching her body. But if you think that Kabir the kidnapper is rich, perish the thought! When she offers to wash up he tells he cannot allow it as she might break a glass and the poor boy that he is, he won’t be able to afford a replacement! A glass for gods sake!

It was at times like these that the audience burst out laughing. We were laughing and commenting almost throughout the movie, busy poking fun at the antics of the characters or at the stupid things they said.

There are also some needless item numbers in the movie.

The actors
Sanjay Dutt plays Vikrant Raina, a rich industrialist divorced from his wife (Vidya Malvade). A lot of reviews have mentioned that the mother daughter duo are mismatched and I agree. They look a few years apart… but I can’t make up mind whether Vidya Malvade looked too young to be a mother of a twenty year old…or whether Minissha looks too old to play her daughter. I think both!

Where acting is concerned the less said the better, and that includes the anti-hero – Imran Khan. It’s hard to picture this man as a bitter ex-convict. So hard that it’s laughable.

Nothing good to say?
I cannot find anything good to say about this movie. The screenplay is poor, the acting below average, the casting terrible, the cinematography and sets below average. But wait…the theme isn’t bad. The movie is about how young people can be wrongly convicted and how their suffering in jail can turn them into hardened criminals. And on the other hand there are other (often wealthy) individuals who commit worse crimes but get away scot-free. Noble theme but poorly executed.

Related Reading: Drona Review
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