Bloody Daddy movie review: A smoothing Shahid Kapoor meets a rough retelling of Sleepless Night

Cast: Shahid Kapoor, Diana Penty, Ronit Roy, Sanjay Kapoor, Rajeev Khandelwal Director: Ali Abbas Zafar Language: Hindi Spoilers ahead Bloody Daddy opens by taking us back in time when that dreaded virus crippled people’s lives and livelihood, through a disclaimer and not visuals. The world has just begun to heal again and the time here is just after the second wave of the pandemic. The film begins in New Delhi in November, mostly 2021. The first joke is about the mask. The second one is about a car crash, bullet shots, and a robbery attempt, all unfolding in the wee hours of the day on an empty road. After all the pandemonium, there’s not a single soul in sight, only a petrified watchman as a witness. It’s amusing (in good ways) how the restrictions posed by Covid-19 become the tool for this bloody daddy (Shahid Kapoor) and his partner in crime to do everything written above. The title has two connotations. Kapoor, appropriately bruised and exhausted, is a single father who’s not what he seems to be. At first, he seems to be channeling his inner Sunny from _Farzi_ , biting more than he can chew but also having his cake and eating it too. When he tells that watchman he’s from Narcotics Bureau, I thought he was bluffing, but no, he indeed is. He’s a bloody daddy because his son has been kidnapped and he’s angry, very very angry. And his son, his estranged wife think he’s barely good for anything, and indirectly through their tense conversations, they may have exploded in their head- Bloody Daddy. After the expanses of Gunday and _Tiger Zinda Hai_ , writer and director Ali Abbas Zafar moves to a concise space of a hotel, and the madness unfolds in a room, kitchen, and even a washroom. The best scene of the film actually happens there when Kapoor asks a debauched dude to repeat after him- No means no, after he forces himself on a lady. Despite echoing the angst of _Kabir Singh_ , Kapoor’s seems like a redemption arc and also a wink at us. It’s impossible not to react. [caption id=“attachment_12710262” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Shahid Kapoor in Bloody Daddy[/caption] Zafar and co-writers Aditya Basu, Sidharth-Garima don’t get everything bang on though. Rajeev Khandelwal, an actor with a solid screen presence, is shown in a glimpse in his introductory shot, but when we meet him for the second time, Zafar zooms on his lips smoking a cigarette and stages the scene as if making us meet him for the first time. Diana Penty is referred to as Lady Singham (these Singham references are really getting tiring now) but she does nothing that can justify that entitlement. Then there are the severe limitations (and cliches) of a genre like this. Rogue officer turns out to be an undercover, honest policeman turns out to be the one who was rogue throughout, a precocious child, and that final expose. The expose here reminded me of Hrithik Roshan unmasking Anupam Kher (unintentionally) in Kaho Naa… Pyaar Hai. _Bloody Daddy_ is a monstrously male-dominated world, with only two women at the heart of the narrative, both chiding Kapoor for his failure to perform his duties- parental and professional. Zafar’s last two films, particularly Bharat, were too stiff, so the filmmaker is clearly trying to have fun with this retelling of the French film Sleepless Night. The performances are purposely hammy, with Sanjay Kapoor not very different from what he did in _Shaandaar_ , and Ronit Roy keeping a straight face and yet mouthing some intermittently funny lines, particularly one involving lactose-free milk. And given how frenzied the plot is, how chaotic the conflict gets, the action-thriller also earns its profanity. Bloody Daddy tries to possess a certain amount of madness to keep the momentum going. It’s like that car whose driver is enjoying his rashness, taking all the bumpiness in between, and reaching the finishing line all battered and bloody. Not sure if he’s yet to become a daddy. Bloody Daddy is now streaming on JioCinema

Rating: 2.5 (out of 5 stars) Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News ,  India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.