An impressive, potential trailer works both ways. It successfully manages to create a positive buzz before the film’s release and it also raises the expectations of the viewers, looking for much more explosive content in the film moving beyond the trailer.
Unfortunately, the usual story repeats itself this week in RAID, as we yet again have a film that falls way short of the excitement and thrills promised by its well-made trailer. In short, if you are expecting some mind blowing sequences of clashes between Ajay Devgn and Saurabh Shukla, as shown in its engaging 3 minutes trailer, then the film doesn’t have much to offer in those terms. But in case you simply wish to see a decent one time watch thriller, reminding you of Neeraj Pandey’s SPECIAL 26 and its recent Tamil remake too, then it might serve the purpose as a well-paced average film, but nothing more than that.
Sharing my personal opinion, I kept waiting for something drastic to happen in its 128 minutes of duration but never got anything that could bring me onto the edge of my seat to be honest. The film begins on a calm note introducing the very few characters (it keeps revolving around), picks up the pace as the raid begins and then goes on and on with not much of a plot or story development till the intermission.
(Spoilers Ahead)
Strangely it never gains the pace back in the second half too as the raid keeps on going with more money discovered from various locations in the same house, till we get to the final 30 minutes of the film showcasing the mob attack. However here too, the mob attacks, the team gets rescued in time and more police force comes to save Ajay Devgn from the villagers declaring the end of the film.
So in a few words, here we have an income tax officer getting an important tip. He raids the house of a local politician, an influential man of the town. The team successfully finds the money from different parts of the house after some initial failures. The politician is unable to get the raid averted using his political connections. A mob coming from adjacent villages tries to stop the Income tax officials from taking the seized valuables. But they still manage to escape and the film ends.
Now I couldn’t understand what the makers found exciting enough in the plot, with no unexpected twists and turns in the entire script till the finale, no story development for almost 80-90 minutes of the film (with just the raid going on) and no edge of the seat entertainment as promised in the trailer.
Besides, it was quite ridiculous to see the wife of the income tax officer coming to the house being raided with 2 big tiffin-boxes for the entire team of more than 20-25 people, when she was supposed to have no information about the secretive raid and the venue. So from where did she get this hidden information – by reading the files left at home by the honest and competent officer confessed by the lady herself!
Plus it was just awful to see a song beginning right in the middle of the raid being conducted and then finishing off just after the opening lines as if it was inserted on gun-point insisted by the exhibitors or the producers who also happen to be the country’s leading music company.
Directed by Raj Kumar Gupta who has given us worth watching films like AAMIR (2008) and NO ONE KILLED JESSICA (2011), RAID cannot be rated as his weakest attempt till date as he has already delivered a GHANCHAKKAR in 2013 as an unexpected brutal shocker. At the same time it also doesn’t match the director’s own set standards (in his initial films) with only a few merits to cheer for, in an otherwise strictly average project that could have been a clear winner.
Mostly being a focused film throughout (minus the forced songs and homely sequences) RAID fairly keeps your engrossed with a tight screenplay till the intermission. And that’s because one keeps expecting a shocking twist to be there soon, which ironically never happens till a very long time leading to a monotonous feel. The writing thankfully never gets into any forced sub-plots, but falls back to the same old clichéd insertion disclosing the filmy revenge motive of the key informer lacking the novelty factor.
There is nothing great to mention in the performance section too, as everyone is just fine in their given roles with nothing exceptional or extra ordinary revealing the actual picture. Both Ajay Devgn and Saurabh Shukla are not able to give anything highly explosive as promised and for that the director and dialogue writer need to share the blame in equal measures. Ajay chooses to remain intense carrying similar expressions throughout for some strange reasons, whereas Ileana does almost nothing in her few scenes playing the brave wife. Frankly the two people who perform much better than the big names in the entire film are Sheeba Chadha and Amit Sial, simply excelling in their small but effective supporting roles.
Summing up, reportedly inspired from true life events of the early 80s, the biggest merit of RAID remains it positivity (also bringing in the former Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi), giving a constructive message to the nation supporting the honest government officers fighting against the black money hoarded by the politicians themselves and the tax-evaded by a big majority of population (continuing till the present).
However with the promised clashes and the excitement missing, this simply remains a positive but average one time watch thriller made on a ‘not so happening’ plot.
Rating : 2.5 / 5
(Note : Almost 80 minutes of RAID can easily be summed up in a 7-8 minutes sequence of THAANAA SERNDHA KOOTTAM (Tamil/2018), which interestingly is not an exact official remake of Neeraj Pandey's SPECIAL 26)
(Note: The article was first published on UC-News Mobile App in March 2018)
