It took me full one week to finally watch the blockbuster Sanju: The biopic of BABA i.e. Sanjay Dutt. The reason for the delay is partly the unavailability of time and mostly because the tickets weren’t just available for the shows I wanted to go for. As you all are aware that this movie has broken all the box office records so this review wouldn’t carry much weight age but old habits die hard, I am going to review this one too.

This is supposed to be a biopic of Sanjay Dutt but to me it’s more like cherry picking the parts with liberal use of cinematic license. Film starts with the search of a biographer to tell the real story of Sanjay Dutt or to be more specific the sanitized life story. The search starts with Hindi speaking Piyush Mishra aka Tripathi ji and ends with the English speaking Winnie Dias played by Anushka Sharma. The film basically deals with the most controversial parts of Sanjay Dutt’s life i.e. his drugs addiction, TADA Case and the domestic life with his latest wife.

We all are defined by the choices we make and this movie is all about that. Rajkumar Hirani chooses to make an ode to the life story Sanjay Dutt and almost blaming everyone else but the actor himself for the bad choices from the pushy drug peddler, over bearing father, the underworld threat calls and the unscrupulous media. Like always he makes a brilliant movie with some exceptional magic movie moments that leaves a lump in the throat.

Ranbir Kapoor chooses to give this movie his best shot and we forget that it is him. He copies the mannerism and sway with perfection. He makes us root for Sanjay Dutt, hold him and protect him and support his bad decisions.

If it were a piece of fiction Sanjay Dutt would have been a hero who falls and rises up each time with more energy and vigour. But sadly this is supposed to be a biopic and fact is stranger than fiction. He cchooses to use drugs, acquire AK 56, have friendships with the underworld and for marrying the times he married and there can’t be easy excuses    for these. Dia Mirza playing Manyata Dutt is acting as Sanskari wife from the Saas-Bahu saga which hardly seemed the reality (well that is a media driven image and they are nothing but just a medium of spreading lies, so we are told on more than one occasion in the movie).

The relationship between father-son is brilliant but somehow I found Paresh Rawal as Late Sunil Dutt a little too filmy and unfit or caricatured. Manisha Koirala as Nargis played her character well and she definitely deserved more screen time. One character that is a stand out is Kamli played brilliantly by Vicky Kaushal as the Gujarati Techie based in America.

There are some standout scene for me like when he goes to his girlfriend’s i.e. Sonal Kapoor (presumably Tina Munim Ambani) place to ask for liquor from her father, the jail scene, the camaraderie between Sanju and Kamli, the scene where is high on drugs and garlands his GF with the toilet seat instead of mangalsutra and his scene with the minister to name a few.

Sanju – The film directed by Rajkumar Hirani is a brilliant cinema if it were to be just a piece of fiction but when you remove uncomfortable questions, important characters/ family members/wifes its doesn’t remain a biopic but rather becomes: SANJU – A LOVE STORY BY RAJKUMAR HIRANI !!