Badlapur Boys review: Suddenly, ‘kabaddi’, that old fusty thing, is sexy

‘Badlapur Boys’ is set in a UP village, and gives us a bunch of ‘anaadi’ but enthusiastic boys who are willing to give up their lives for ‘kabaddi’. The premise is fine, and in a skilled director’s hands it may have become a ‘kabaddi’ ‘Lagaan’, given that it has naive villagers, unscrupulous villains, and a win that will guarantee pride and honour.

But the film’s plot is riddled with mothballed cliches. A father gives up his life, a son is left moping, and a mother constantly crying. The ‘kabaddi boys’ are more ‘men’, and the treatment makes it banal and dull.

You are engaged only when the game is on, and it appears to have been executed with some authenticity : that should have been the sole focus of the film.