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AK vs AK (2020)
If you want to let the supreme image of Motwane as the creator of Sacred Games remain in your head, kindly skip this
The director decided to experiment with the craft of storytelling by taking a documentary approach on a fictional story. Sadly, the experiment fell flat. Why? The execution.
The film lacks a singular approach. The director starts off with a documentary style Mira Nair film and ends it like an Abbas Mastaan plot twisting film. A singular approach would have been better. To be more clear, the first two acts are Mira Nair and the third act of the film is just another film and Abbas Mastaan film. The third act just doesn't work and the entire execution feels like a first year film school student making their first feature trying their hands at plot twists.
The first act was good and well set up, the second was dragged needlessly and the third, well, it was another film. The twists and story beats don't work here. The endless finding and chase of one of the characters in the second act was needless. One of the actors portrayed as Sherlock was an unnecessary intervention. You will find many films, especially film school ones where a writer tries to write a story or script and then his film starts playing out exactly like the screenplay and by the end the protag finds the script and reads the ending and sees it it come true. Check out THE FINAL DRAFT directed by Indranil Kashyap on youtube. Quite similar.
What works is the documentary style of shooting as the characters are real life but I know many people will have a problem with the cinematography and yes the lighting, grading and shot taking could have been better.
Honestly, it felt like Motwane didn't put the same effort as Sacred Games. It felt like one night he was having a nice drink with Kashyap and a few drinks later he said "Anurag ek mast story aya hai. Ek director ko ek superstar se true perfomance nikalwana hota hai toh woh uski beti ko kidnap karta hai aur usse dhunde bolta hai and ek camera usse follow karta." *Anurag claps and says ye toh Ram Gopal Verma jaisa director hai*. "Haan, aur sun isko documentary style shoot karengey". *Anurag is like commercial going audience will not like it.* So Motwane is like "Netflix pe daal dengey, chote screen pe kharab lighting pata nahi chalega and story mein plot twists daal dengey and end mein actor ko award jitwa dengey for feels. Like Tees Maar Khan type ending." Anurag says lets do it and here we are with 'AK vs AK'