Guess who's back?

Not much guessing required...since this is quite obviously MY blog and the person who's back has got to be...well me!

The reason i'm back after a month-half hiatus is due to this fantastic movie i watched yesterday. Shootout at Lokhandwala. It has given me the inspiration to write again..well perhaps just for this one post, before i pull yet another disappearing stunt from the virtual world of words and thoughts. Or then again, maybe not.

Shootout is a movie based on a cat and mouse game of real-life policeman A.A Khan and his nemesis Mahendra Dolas, then most notorious criminal of the early 90s in Mumbai and supposed right-hand man to Dawood Ibrahim or Chhota Rajan. This bit is slightly hazy since there is no actual confirmation in reality whether Mahendra Dolas was in fact working with the D-Company or had sided Chhota Rajan immediately after the latter's split from the company. Chhota Rajan had came out to validate this claim, but as always was rubbished by the cops and media.

Anyway, back to the plot. Mahendra Dolas a.k.a Maya Dolas is the principal antagonist of this film and played astonishingly well by Vivek Oberoi. His most noteworthy role after Company. This just strengthens my belief that Vivek is meant to play roles connected to the reel-life takes on the D-Company. The character of Maya Dolas is one which is rather hard to understand. In many ways, he's an enigma. Did he do all those things he was said to have done simply because he enjoyed doing it and having all that power or did he do it to furthur his career, like any career-minded individual? Assasination, espionage and extortions are careers too..
albeit not ethical ones. The movie doesn't do justice to Maya Dolas i feel. His character keeps going through so many transitions, it was hard to figure out exactly what his motivations were. But then again, Vivek Oberoi lived as Maya for 2 months before doing the role. Perhaps he meant to potray Maya as an enigma. That's something which is up for debate i guess

Maya Dolas's right hand man Dilip Buwa is played by Tusshar Kapoor. While i agree with all the other reviews out there that Tusshar was hopelessly miscast in this role, he did make the character out to be slightly likeable and as such I, as part of an audience, was able to empathise with his death. The real Dilip Buwa on the other hand was a twisted character with no redeeming qualities.

The other two noteworthy members of Maya Dolas's gang are Fattu Fatim played by Rohit Roy and RC played by Shabbir Ahluwalia. The former was characterized in the movie as a seedha-saadha ladhka who was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time and fell into the wrong company and in the eventuality, ended up dying for no real reason except for his unwavering loyalty to Maya Dolas and his friends.

RC was perhaps one of the more intriguing characters in the movie. Well to me anyway. You don't really get an idea why and how he fell into the Underworld. But you do know that he feel remorse for each murder he committed. He refuses to stay sober simply because when he does, he sees 'ghosts' (hallucinations really) of people that he had murdered. This ultimately leads to his death.

There were two other members of the Maya Dolas gang as well, but i did not feel them to be noteworthy enough to warrant a mention in my review. Suffice to say, they died as well.

The main 'protagonists' were characterized by Sanjay Dutt, Suniel Shetty and Arbaaz Khan who played ACP Shamsher Khan, Inspector Kaviraj Patil and Sub-Inspector Javed Sheikh respectively. These men need no introduction as actors and the depth of their characters is best explained along with the premise, plot and character development of the movie.

The basic premise of the story is quite aptly summed up by the title of the movie itself - Shootout at Lokhandwala. As described, it is a shootout between 300 policemen headed by ACP Shamsher Khan (modelled after real-life ex-policeman A.A Khan who also appears in the movie as the Commissioner) and Maya Dollas plus 5 in a residential block - Swati building located at Lokhandwala. The civilians were given NO WARNING when the shooutout first began with the police opening fire and no civilians were evacuated at any time during the shooutout. In fact, anyone seen leaving the complex after the lockdown had taken place, was mercilessly gunned down. It didn't matter one whit if he was a civilian, a member of Maya Dolas's gang or even Jesus-F-Christ, had he decided to miraculously appear and negotiate peace talks.

The background to the story begins with Operation Bluestar in 1984 where Sikh terrorists began establishing a base in Mumbai and the consequent police-terrorist interactions. Emboldened by his eventual lockdown on the Sikh terrorists, ACP Shamsher Khan sets up ATS - Anti Terrorist Squad, modelled after SWAT of the USA. The motto of ATS - "shoot to kill". The term loosely and might i add...VERY loosely used - Encounter. They might as well have said Execution and be done with it. That would have at least made some sense of the madness that was shootout at Lokhandwala.

In an attempt to curb Maya Dolas's spreading influence in Mumbai, ATS headed by Shamsher and his two goons - Kaviraj and Javed - do everything it takes to corner Maya Dolas and co. It goes to the extent where the supposed right side of the law abuse the power given to them and start threatening the families of those involved in the gang.

But does Maya give up? Of course not. He and his merry band of followers hit right back at the cops and their families.

It is at this point that the audience starts questioning the motives of the police. The duty of the police is to protect the innocent and apprehend the guilty. In here, that line was so thin.. they stomped all over it and shredded it to a million pieces. Suniel Shetty as Kaviraj Patil was particularly appalling.

Now we get to the actual shootout. As mentioned earlier, innocents were not protected. Hell no. If anything, they were at more risk then the actual gundas themselves..because really, what does a civilian know of AK-47s? His first instinct would be to run, not to hide. That's basic survival instinct. Unfortunately, no civilian knows that the bullets of an AK-47s are incredibly deadly and there is quite frankly no way of escaping.

Now to the gundas. This part's a little tricky because there are so many versions floating out there about what really happened (despite a live telecast of the incident on CNN during that time). So, i'm just going to the stick to the movie version, which is apparently the police's version. Even their own version doesn't cast them in a good light.

The constitution of any democractic country states that once a criminial surrenders or is relieved of his weapon, he is in no position to fight back and thus should be apprehended and handed over the court of law for judgement. Shooutout completely disregards this and ACP Shamsher Khan takes shoot to kill very literally. It doesn't matter if the guy has no weapon. It doesn't matter if the guy is comatose and near death anyway after having a TV smashed through his head. It doesn't matter if the guy is begging to surrender. We shoot them anyway. Summary-style execution. Riddle their already dead bodies with more bullets until they are rendered unrecognisable. The sheer brutality of the police in this movie will send you reeling and thinking. This is what happens when we as people given any organisation too much power. Absolute power corrupts. This movie showcases that extremely well.

Maya Dolas was a criminal. No doubt. He was a fucktard who ought to have been hung. But that is for the court of law to decide. Not for some fucktard policeman who was getting his jollies off by having that much power in his hands! Dilip Buwa was already half-dead. Yet he was dragged down several flights of steps like an animal and executed simply because he was still able to take a few breaths. That man would have died anyway with the kind of injuries he had! Was it that necessary to give him such an ignoble death?

We give our cows, chickens better deaths. And yet humankind through so many centuries has still not evolved enough to want to treat members of his own species with the kind of respect and dignity we willingly give members of the 'lesser' species.

The best part? After an utter sham of an inquiry, ACP Shamsher and co. get off scot-free. Where's the justice in this, i ask you?

Shootout at Lokhandwala is not a perfect movie. No movie really is. But it gives one a good understanding of how fucked up the humankind can get. And for that, i say, give it a watch.

Subz out! I'll be back...when i'm back!