‘Brahmastra’: A Laser & Lighting Spectacle in Search of a Story

Brahmastra: Part One — Shiva (3D/2D)

Cast: Ranbir Kapoor, Alia Bhatt, Amitabh Bachchan, Mouni Roy, Nagarjuna, Dimple Kapadia

Direction: Ayan Mukerji

Rating: ★★

Showing in theatres

Brahmastra wants to tell us a bedtime-type of fantasy story about a boy with special powers, a pyaari si commoner he meets and falls in love with and how he fights powerful evil forces to save her and the world from destruction. 

There isn’t much to the love story except a bit of milna, dance karna on Kesariya, bichharna and then milna again. It’s the alternate world that the boy inhabits that powers the story. It’s a world explained to us in desi gobbledegook — the bharmaand (universe) is protected by various kinds of ancient shaktis, divine astra-shastra. There are the gods and the good guys who want the world to be a safe, happy place, and the bad guys who want to destroy and control the world.

Brahmastra conjures up a lot of Hindu devi-devtas and religious iconography, but its world is made up of stolen foreign items. Almost all its characters, weapons of mass destruction and plot lines are inspired by Harry Potter, Lord of The Rings, The Eternals.

For the sake of supernatural thrills, we are okay even with this and want to go along. 

The problem is that despite mining all available fantasy epics and superheroes, and inhabiting a vast expanse of 2 hours and 47 minutes, writer-director Ayan Mukerji can’t string together a coherent, compelling story about a boy and a girl stalked by the dark lord.

Brahmastra does have a few dramatic moments. Most of these are courtesy a starry cameo, a scary Mouni Roy, and a hyper-excited CGI department that keeps mounting laser shows. It also has some nice songs, but it is so inarticulate that it has to keep pausing the narrative to give us information, via a voiceover, about secret shaktis, deadly astras and evil designs. 

Brahmastra is Ayan Mukerji’s third film in 13 years. Officially it cost Rs 410 crores and was five years in the making. The film goes to many places where we meet many people, but after every burst of action, there are long dry, dull patches where nothing happens. That’s because its screenplay is like a compendium of borrowed ideas and missed opportunities. And the result is a film that is a spectacle in search of a story.

Shiva (Ranbir Kapoor) is a DJ who plays music and dances at Dussehra parties. He is also, like Harry Potter, an orphan whose parents had superpowers and those have been passed on to him.  

One day at a party he spots a girl and chases to tell her, “You are rich, I am poor”. Isha (Alia Bhatt) says she doesn’t mind, and visits his world that’s full of cute little orphans who tease Shiva about phasaoing a girl who is totally out of his league.  

Isha is so moved by all this that she weeps a little and summarises how special Shiva is. But she doesn’t know that like Harry, he too has visions accompanied by fits. So, while she thinks they are romancing, Shiva is actually watching a direct telecast in his head of a scientist fighting some evil forces. 

The scientist, who lives in a strange glass building suspended in air, is being attacked by one Junoon (Mouni Roy) and her two hefty flunkeys — Raftar and Zor. They all have tattoos, long hair, wear unisex black gowns, emit red light, and their name denotes their key attribute. 

Junoon & Co. worship at the altar of someone they call Brahmadev and are on a mission to piece together Brahmastra, a fat stone-and-metal disk that had to be split into three to be kept safe and away from the bad guys. 

Brahmadev, who has world domination plans, is actually a tall statue that, like Bhagwan Shivji, holds a trishul and probably took some gym sessions with Ranveer Singh.

Anyway, Junoon is quite efficient. She grabs one piece of the Brahmastra puzzle as well as the scientist’s special anklet which is actually Vanar Astra that, when worn, allows one to jump around like Bhagwan Hanuman. After that Junoon tries to extract information about who has the other pieces.  

Varanasi, it seems, is the next stop in the treasure hunt, and then one secret ashram in the hills where one Guru lives. 

As Junoon and the love birds both arrive in Varanasi, Isha freaks out when Shiva tells her: “Mera aag se rishta hai, aag se main jalta nahin”. Bro, that should be the line you say after “Hello.”

But Isha can’t stay angry for long because there’s Brahmastra and a special bangle — the Nandi Astra — to protect.

While I was feeling like we are on a shopping trip to gather items for the dark lord’s wedding trousseau, Junoon gets busy conjuring up what looked like the Eye of Sauron and Isha-Shiva key in the secret address of Guru’s Ashram in Google Maps and start driving towards it.

The ashram looks like a retirement retreat where oldies gather in the main garden to do mild yoga. Sometimes they also emit lightning bolts, Dimple Kapadia flies a helicopter and some young people practice their superpowers. 

Here Shiva is told by Guru (Amitabh Bachchan) that he, the love child of Amrita and Dev, is Agni Astra who must find his “on button.” Shiva tries, and though he begins to create and throw balls of fire and can even make streaks of fire dance, he needs a spark to begin. So, Guru gives him a Zippo lighter. Yep, a Zippo.

This is a good moment to pause and ponder over this entire enterprise and Bollywood’s very unique inability to tell stories.

Brahmastra is full of stupid moments like using a Zippo to destroy the dark lord’s army, a superhero figuring out in the climax, as he is fighting to save the world from destruction, that water can douse his fire. Plus, there are some truly moronic dialogues. Sample this: Before a rather exciting car chase sequence, Isha says to Shiva as he struggles with visions and fits, “Tum saans lo, main gaadi chalati hoon”.

All these moments in the film could have been thought through and fixed. They could have either been serious moments, like it is in Amar Chitra Katha and Chandamama stories. Or, if the writers wanted bursts of modernity and humour to make an ancient tale sparkle, these could have been used to give the film some swag. Sadly, Brahmastra has lots of stupidity but no swag. 

The film, in fact, is so bogged down by the minutiae of its fantasy story that, even in the climactic fight, when the world is crumbling, lives are precariously dangling, Shiva and Junoon are throwing red and golden fireballs that are bursting on the screen, and there’s ear-splitting music, a voiceover arrives to explain things to us. 

Who does that? Who kills the experience of a big climactic fight with a dull, expository voiceover?

And the worst is that despite all the explanations, a thousand simple questions remain. 

For example, we are told that if the three parts of Brahmastra are joined, the world will be destroyed. But, errr… It was in one piece initially, right. Wasn’t the world intact then?

Also, doesn’t the dark lord know that joining the parts means the end of the world? Or is his world domination plan all about having a staycation with Junoon so that they can skulk about in the dusty ruins of a world that once was?  

I hope producer Karan Johar and director Ayan Mukerji tweet the answers to these questions instead of mounting part 2 and 3 of DullAstra.