Movie Review: Jail

To present a movie which highlights the injustice heaped upon innocents in one thing, but to have a nightclub song and dance in the same film is plain ludicrous. 'Jail' fails to be a must-watch hard hitting flick because it ends up frustratingly muddle headed.

Like in the final third of 'Fashion', director Madhur Bhandarkar loses focus and the protagonist's predicament doesn't quite seem convincing. A few unintentionally hilarious courtroom scenes, coupled with a ho-hum climax make 'Jail' a 2-hour-long prison sentence for those looking for a 'Page 3' or 'Chandni Bar'.

So what went wrong here? Neil Nitin Mukesh's acting for one, because he is not much different in 'Jail' than he was in 'New York' or 'Johnny Gaddar'; he tries really hard and excels at time but the confused, astonished, frightened look from his previous films seems stamped on his countenance. The female 'lead' (if you can her that) Mugdha Godse is completely lost in oblivion as well, peering through wide eyes sporting a shell shocked look of concern throughout. Bhandarkar's constant insinuations of 'true stories' gets tiresome as well, (Anurag Kashyap already used the BMW case in Dev D).

Coming to the story, Parag Dixit (Neil Nitin Mukesh) is an ambitious bloke who has everything going for him. He's got a swanky job and hot girlfriend Mansi ( Mugdha Godse) who loves him more than anything else. The cookie crumbles when Parag is caught in web of drugs and deceit, his buddy turns out to be a drug dealer; the junkie slips into a coma while the police nab Parag and haul him in a Thane prison. Parag spends the next two harrowing years shuttling between the gaol and the courtroom. Parag is introduced to the nightmares of prison food, solitary confinement, hopelessness, desperation and the other luxurious of a prison sentence. To add the bitter salt, his trial is delayed by legal glitches. There are the token corrupt cops, corrupt lawyers, distressed family members and supportive heroine adding up to a rather feeble depiction of injustice.

In the cell Parag finds an empathizing friend in Manoj Bajpai who plays Nawab, a butcher who is in for gutting a couple of men. There is Ghani, a good guy losing it in prison, along with the thug Kabir (Arya Babbar) and the poetic Ghalib. All these secondary characters, apart from Bajpai are unfortunately forgettable. Their back stories don't the least bit add anything to the storyline, quite unlike in Bhandarkar's previous flicks. The one thing Bhandarkar gets right is a scene in which the jailor vents about his unforgivable working hours and non existent salary.

Ultimately 'Jail' turns out to be just meandering and dull, instead of shocking or hard hitting. Problem is, almost all of the characters in the film are borderline stereotypical and hollow. Languid dialogues don't help, and the story becomes more and more formulaic as the pace slackens. Thankfully Bhandarkar does not make a cameo in this movie, but maybe its time he moved on to a new genre, comedy perhaps.