Game

Game is meant to be a serious suspense thriller but emerges as a stylised no-brainer of an action drama.

Kabir Malhotra Anupam Kher,a tycoon,summons four completely diverse Indians from across the globe to his private island in Samos,Greece. Neil Menon Abhishek Bachchan is a casino owner in Istanbul,a front for his real business in drugs. O.P.Ramsay Boman Irani is the Indian Prime Ministerial candidate in Thailand,who traffics in young girls. Tisha Khanna Shahana Goswami is a journalist in London with a yen for alcohol and Vikram Kapoor Jimmy Sheirgill is a Mumbai film star who has been involved in a hit-and-run case but has covered it up and buried his victim live before this can ruin his career.

Kabir tells them that he plans to expose them all,the link being his late daughter Maya Sarah Jane-Dias who was kidnapped and made a prostitute by Ramsays men,introduced to drugs by Neil and killed by Vikram. Tisha is Kabirs other daughter and she will get the scoop and her real father. But Tisha refuses to forgive Kabir,and the next day Kabir commits suicide. And investigating officer Sia Kangna Ranaut assig-ned by the International Vigilance Squad smells a rat.

As the layers unravel,you get a plot that could have been really ingenious except for the fact that the writer Althea Delmas Kaushal and director Abhinay Deo prefer to make the story plain silly by relying excessively on stylised narration and action. The music is a cardinal weak point that could have boosted the films appeal and salvaged the scenario even in a film that ultimately would not make it to the box-office,but Game loses out even on that front.

Consider then the glaring flaws Kabir says that money can help achieve anything and buy people if need be. But if he had been separated from his non-identical twin daughters years ago,how did he know,sitting in an island in Greece,who they were and where they were located in the entire world? And even if Kabir extracted a confession from Kapoors friend of how he killed Maya,how did he know that in far-off Mumbai,Maya was bumped off one rainy night on a lonely road by Kapoor? There are many other cardinal blunders too.

Exceptional technical values like Kartik Vijays camerawork,Baylon Fonsecas sound design and Shashank Teres art direction go for a toss in a film that is meant to be a serious suspense thriller but emerges as a stylised no-brainer of an action drama. The two cops Sia and her assistant move across continents as if they are moving from one Mumbai suburb to another with flight services at their disposal! The drug cartel angle of Neil is not convincing. And the two graves on the island look truly ridiculous.

Director Abhinay Deo shows a commendable grasp on technique but fails to look at the vital content,read script. The actors do what is needed 8211; very efficiently. Sarah is okay,but it is Kangna who shines as the cop. Abhishek Bachchan is very impressive as the sardonic Neil and Gauhar Khan is good in the early sequences but falters in the climax. Anupam Kher,Boman Irani and Jimmy are good as always.

Rating:

One star for the cast and one for the technical finesse.

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