Anupama Chopra
Bholaa is Kaithi on steroids. Director, leading man, and co-producer Ajay Devgn take Lokesh Kanagaraj’s 2019 action drama – Kaithi means prisoner - and cranks up the volume, literally and metaphorically, to 11.
The operating principle of this film is more is more. So there are multiple bad guys who have so many henchmen attacking Bholaa on so many occasions that it’s impossible to keep count. Every frame is stylized to within an inch of its life.
Bholaa resembles a video game with its titular character moving up levels one by one. One of the bad guys seems straight out of Pirates of the Caribbean.
Kaithi wasn’t overtly interested in realism or logic either. But Lokesh deftly married Western tropes with masala sensibilities.
Like the other three films in which Ajay has directed himself – U Me Aur Hum, Shivaay, and Runway 34 – in Bholaa also, his character is a father and very much, the alpha male. Bholaa is essentially a superhero without a cape but with celestial overtones.
Ajay isn’t a dull director. He works consistently to keep the story moving and the visuals, by DOP Aseem Bajaj, are flashy but inventive.