final truth
crime drama
director: Mahesh Manjrekar
starring: Salman Khan, Aayush Sharma, Mahima Makwana, Sachin Khedekar, Rohit Haldikar, Sayaji Shinde, Jisshu Sengupta, Chhaya Kadam, Upendra Limaye, Nikitin Dheer, Waluscha D’Souza and Varun Dhawan.
by Joginder Tuteja
When Vaastav was released in 1999, it emerged as a good box office success. Over the years it went on to enjoy cult status among movie buffs and some films were made with a common man turning into a gangster on the underworld especially in the first decade of the new millennium. Mahesh Manjrekar, Ram Gopal Varma, Madhur Bhandarkar took this formula forward and exposed the harsh reality of crime and criminals.
Though not many films were repeated in the same genre between 2010 and 2020, Mahesh Manjrekar now brings the final – The Final Truth which picks up the same thread of his Sanjay Dutt starrer reality and a film that puts the old Ayush Sharma in big shoes. asks to fill. Good thing the actor actually tries and changes his entire personality to bring out a wrong-guy act in this redux version. He gets really angry from his younger days and so when he becomes a gangster in the unlikely city of Pune, the change is not sudden.
That said, it is the world he enters in which some questions arise. Admittedly, there is a lot of anger in him because his farmer father Sachin Khedekar had to leave his ‘land’ and become a poor porter in a loading/unloading house. However, it is difficult to digest why the young man would commit the exact same crime that robbed his childhood.
To the credit of Mahesh Manjrekar and his editor Bunty Negi, the drama progresses well for the most part of the story. Yes, Salman Khan scenes seem ‘placed’ as item sequences, especially in the first half. The scenes featuring him and Aayush have been done well but then a lot of volatility is expected. The interval sequence is well done and from there the second half is full of Salman Khan, which will help his fans cheer out loud. The tricks he plays (though seen in earlier movies) to actually eliminate the gang are also well done. However, one would have expected him to roar really loudly at least once.
For a gangster film, it surprisingly nailed down on a few other occasions as well, especially when it comes to a love story. To be honest, considering the kind of film Antim – The Final Truth is, it could have ended the romantic angle entirely. Here, what cooks up between Aayush and newcomer Mahima Makwana may go away completely. Now that the actress doesn’t hold herself well on screen, it’s just that Aayush’s rise in the gangster space has been more invested with many other characters to come along (Upendra Limaye being the most prominent) and so you want There’s a deco on what happens.
The film, however, gives the message that crime is of no use, but it doesn’t stop nonetheless. There is a very important dialogue from the mouth of Salman Khan, which is ‘As police, we only supply raw material to the world of crime’. It reveals the ‘truth’ and also makes you wonder if the crime that comes out is actually the ‘anti’.
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