Shorgul

Cast: Jimmy Shergill, Ashutosh Rana, Suha Gezen

Directors: Pranav Singh, Jitentra Tiwari

Based on the true story on the communal riots of Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar in 2013, Shorgul turned into a ‘clichéd melodrama’, which created quite a furor before release with a batch of excellent actors. 

Shorgul starts with showcasing the communal riots and its inevitable consequences, without much experiment in the framework and plot. An unrest plotted by the political leaders, played by Jimmy Shergill and Ashutosh Rana, Shorgul also refers to actual references to names that came to notice t that time.

Zainab (Suha Gezen) is in love with Salim (Hiten Tejwani). But Rahgu’s (Anirudh Dave) feelings for the leading lady create tension.  Suha is portrayed as an ‘over the top and a soppy ’60s heroine.’ The love story once more is intercepted by Ashutosh Rana, who plays Raghu’s father. A dark character indeed for Rana, which had earned him much popularity on screen, is shown as a ‘pacifist’ whose very carefully shows up opportunism to both Hindu and Muslim leaders.

Showcasing the much passé storyline of Hindu- Muslim love story, a critical situation, silhouettes changing weapons and guns, aggravating political parties and political leaders- all jam packed in one movie-made the fatal combination to watch it for two long hours. Plus, an item-number by Hrishitaa Bhatt made Shorgul a nightmare which had no connection of being soothing- neither visually nor audibly.    

While the EXIN Times correspondent felt that the actors were not used to the fullest, both Ashutosh Rana and Jimmy Shergill gave a controlled performance in Shorgul. Turkish debutant Suha Gezen, as we felt, is loud on screen.

Shorful’s dialogues and lines like- Dangon mein Hindu ya Mulasmaan nahin marta, insaniyat marta hain. and Suresh marey ya Salim ise koi farak nahin padta – is the only place to make it watch-worthy to take a look on the details of Muzaffarnagar riot, one of the prominent after the Gujarat riot. Even the music by Jatin-Laliit had failed to grab attention of the audiences.