Review: RACE 3

Where is Shirtless Salman? Where? Where?

(For Fulltoo Paisa Vasool, he needs to take that shirt off every twenty minutes!)

2 stars

Mini Review:

If you've seen Race movies, then you will know that everyone double crosses everyone else in really tacky disco, hotel settings. Everyone drives really expensive cars that are shown in wild car chases and expensive cars are blown up without impunity. Of course here too, everyone doublecrosses each other, but only Salman Khan (Sikander) knows everything and beats them all. Sikander's shirtless scene take so long in coming, people were leaving the theatre. We watched, fueled by coffee until the very end where they threaten another pointless sequel.

Main Review:

It's not a Salman Khan movie if the shirt doesn't come off!

It happens, but not before you see a topless Bobby Deol. EWWWWWW! Who wants to see that?!
Salman Khan then stands tall on the sand dunes, in his elevator shoes, shirt burning, then shirtless, two hours twenty minutes into the movie. For a fan, that's too much waiting for seetis! So blah yaar!

And romance? So feeka feeka! Jacquilene Fernandes wears all those sexy clothes but behaves so coy! Who made this rubbishy Race? Where are the steamy hot Bipasha type scenes that made the first film so watchable!

Should not have Facepalmed at 'Ik baar baby selfish hoke apne liye jiyo naa!' It was like the film telling you, be selfish, walk out... This film is going to be awful!

Some movies were made for DVDs. You could then happily fast forward the really boring scenes and go directly to the action. Action scenes which mainly involve cars blowing up, and Salman Khan stunts. The best scene in fact involves Salman and a motorbike. That itself deserves a star and a half. 

And who wrote this gawdawful dialog, 'Our business is our business, and none of your business.'? Mouthed by Daisy Shah who looks so wrong in that setting, you keep thinking she's going to do dandiya and break into the photocopy song! Not that her twin Saquib Saleem is any better. He is made to say, 'Bro' so often you wonder if he just turned twelve instead of 25!

Old DoubleCross Story. But they talk in Billions instead of 'Karod'

I've liked Race movies simply because the girls use guns and are 'bad' rather happily and remorselessly. They are thankfully not the 'sati savitri types'. But then their betrayal by seduction was first class Bollywood ishtyle in the earlier movies. Here it is so blah, you think Jacquilene Fernandes was wearing her home clothes (yes, she wears red stripey yoga pants!). 

The rest is the same ole tried and tested (and hence terribly tired) double-cross thing. Everyone and their uncle is out to double cross one another. And their betrayal is not even concealed. It's downright boring. They look like they are rich and talk in billions as if they were talking about spare change. Then they talk about bearer bonds (seriously?! They went out of style in 1988 with Bruce Willis' Die Hard, the first one when Alan Rickman falls to his death from Nakatome Plaza!)

Bhojpuri in the Middle East. Because, roots!

Anil Kapoor is patriarch. He has one nephew and twins. Salman Khan plays nephew Sikander, and the twins are Daisy Shah and Saquib Salim. They are super rich and super angry and super able to dodge bullets. They bash up at least twenty baddies each and break so much glass you wonder if this is a 'Race' to deafen the audience. And the plot to blackmail Indian politicians via an Interpol officer by paying off a silly hotel employee (who has kept a 'hard drive' hidden in a locker in Cambodia and is protected by his fingerprint) seems weirdly far-fetched. You wonder, why can't he pick it up himself? But then how else do we see Saquib Saleem use a light sabre to break open the safe and then steal from the bank that is alarmless!)

Speaking of alarmless banks, I was alarmed and yet relieved that no local bystanders or passing vehicles are either shown or hurt when the cast of Race 3 is blowing up cars and motorbike guys indiscriminately. I am happy to report that there is a disco in Cambodia full of Indians. Please avoid it if planning to visit that country.   

Cast hai ki Leftovers of a Race?

Then there's Yash. Played by Bobby Deol. Whose bright ideas was to cast this creature, you wonder! Where are the the Saif Ali Khans, Akshaye Khanna, the sirens like Bipasha Basu and Katrina Kaif? This cast is like the leftovers of a race rather than the real thing.

This time Race takes us from Al Shifa in the desert (presumably an empty Middle East), Handiya (a district in Allahabad, India), to Beijing to Cambodia and of course many computer generated snow clad mountain scenes that could be Switzerland, lake side scenes for romantic songs. 

Also someone tell the filmmakers to dress the cast according to the weather and not just for 'tashan' (style!). Poor Anil Kapoor makes an appearance in a velvet coat in scene one, and after that is shown to wear a trench coat. He's located in the Middle East! There's sanddunes around, and a blazing Sun overhead. 

But you will be distracted by all the mindless disco songs inserted for some reason or the other. And when the lyrics are so terrible: Weekend ki paartiyaan hain, ek main aur ek tu saath mein hain, aur haath mein hai tattoo!' you end up adding 'bro' to every line and hope they all die horribly.