This is one movie I had really high hopes about - maybe because at some subconscious level, I thought it might be an adaptation of one of Amish Tripathi's novels, or at least borrow some ideas from! The awesome action seen in the trailer only served to heighten those expectations.
The movie opens to a great sequence, the cinematography, the locale and the background score creating a sense of purpose and direction that's hard to buy into. Sadly, just like the protagonist (Ajay Devgan) nosediving down the steep cliffs, the movie goes just one way - downhill - from there on.
In spite of some great action shots and wonderful locales and the breathtaking cinematography, the movie is done in by stretched sequences of uncalled for emotional drama that completely upsets the pace and the narrative, dialogues that are unintentionally funny where they should be taut, and insipid direction and editing, where a good cut of the scissor could have made this a movie Jason Bourne could have been proud of. Entire scenes could have been snipped out and no one would have missed a thing!
Ajay Devgan the actor is let down by Ajay Devgan the director. The two imports, Erika Kaar (Ajay's love interest) and Abigail Eames (his daughter) are decent, except when Erika mouths the overly accented Hindi dialogues. Thankfully, Abigail is verbally challenged and doesn't have to go through the torture. Vir Das, Girish Karnad and Saurabh Shukla are completely wasted, which is such a shame. And the tub scene being the highlight of Sayesha Saigal's debut, it does her no favors.
News is that the directors have obliged distributors and cut off a good 10-15 mins - and that might just make Shivaay a lot more tolerable. From me, 2.5 stars out of 5, the negative marking not so much for what's missing, but what should have never been there in the first place!
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