Director: Anthony D’Souza

Cast: Akshay Kumar, Mithun Chakraborty, Ronit Roy, Shiv Pandit and Aditi Rao Hydari

Boss is a leave-your-brains-behind total commercial entertainer. It’s meant to be enjoyed with your gang. You’re meant to clap and whistle as the hero bashes the numerous goons matrix style and laugh at the cornball jokes. Because it’s a guy thing. A butch thing. You aren’t meant to dissect the already murdered screenplay because no one has thought of sending this film to the Sundance Festival anyways.

Such films have become a specialty for Akshay Kumar. He’s the sort of the person who can take a South original and twist it around into his own inimitable style. For those who are a sucker for trivia Boss is an official remake of Malayalam movie Pokkiri Raja, starring Mammootty. No need to be alarmed. This new and updated version of Boss doesn’t bear a remote resemblance to the original. There’s wacked out humour here. Boss doesn’t fight unless there’s background music playing. And he resorts to cheesy dialogue and sms humour even as he’s beating up the bad guys.

For those who want to know the story (or the lack of it), here it goes: Boss (Akshay Kumar) is turned away from home by his Gandhian father Mithun Chakraborty. He’s mentored by a large-hearted god father Danny Denzongpa. Somewhere in this rigmarole hides a younger brother, Shiv Pandit, who has kind of lost his way. There’s a corrupt cop, Ronit Roy, who tries to play the ultimate baddie. Viewers with a chronic case of the male gaze have Sonakshi Sinha in item numbers. And there’s the svelte Aditi Rao Hydari, prancing around wearing bikinis. Women have the colourful job of engaging the male audience in the right ways.  

So what happens in the film? Well, Akshay kind of beats the bad guy to a pulp, tells a few jokes and generally has a good time. There are some heavy-duty emotional scenes as well where everyone forgives everybody. You can have a good time with the lead hero, if you enjoy that kind of entertainment. You know the kind that barely makes sense.

Do you get your money’s worth in the end? Well, if you had liked Rowdy Rathore and Khiladi 786 and other Akshay Kumar random action comedies then you’ll certainly like this. God save you if you don’t subscribe to the above brand of cinema. Oh yes, Anthony D’Souza’s direction is miles ahead of his debut outing Blue. Akshay is charming as ever. That’s what we call paisa vasool.

More on: Boss, Movie Review, Akshay Kumar, Sonakshi Sinha, Aditi Rao Hydari, Anthony DSouza, Mithun Chakraborty, shiv pandit

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