Brahmastra review thread [WITH SPOILERS]

As the main review thread has clear instructions to not post spoilers I've created this thread so that those of us who want to post reviews which might include spoilers can do so. 

The title clearly mentions that this thread will have spoilers so enter at your own risk. 

@Mods I don't know if such threads are allowed, if not you can merge this in the main one. 

ETA : My review is on the Page 2.

Question 

Who was shiva’s mom? Deepika? I couldn’t see her face but from body it looked like it was her.🧐🤯😶‍🌫️😶🫢

I have entered don’t throw me out as I’m entering as a spectator and be cool to see others comments.. here !! I will be quiet 🤫 

⭐️ M A S T E R P I E C E - 4.8/5 ⭐️

The "Astraverse" is a unique cinematic universe. Since we in the audience are cheering for the real-life wedded pair, Ranbir and Alia have an abundance of charisma and style that jumps off the screen and captures your heart. In every sense, this is a stunning tale that serves as the ideal prologue to one of the greatest trilogies in Hindi film history. That will make every fan of Indian cinema happy. Additionally, for the money they spent, the VFX quality is unmatched.

Angreji dekh rahe ho Laundey ki uper, phir. Khan Saab ki entry shuro mein hi ho jaati hai, aur janaab kya lag rahe hain. Poori seetiyaan hooting shuro, ye cameo se badh ke tha. Mujhe Dev wala Ladka Srk hi lagta hai, he & deepika would be apt couple for Dev version.

It will give you goosebumps several times. Definitely view this movie on a large screen. The second-best 3D film after Avatar. Despite having a smaller budget than Marvel, a number of things were accomplished that sometimes exceeded Marvel. The hype was true to form. I am really excited about the upcoming sections. The starting point has been established. I hope everyone enjoys it and doesn't boycott it for pointless problems. A mythology well worth viewing. The explanations were excellent.

Alia's entry is biggest plus of this film. She completely owned RK in intro scene & her dance on chikni chameli was Super se bhi Uper. She has very prominent role & I totally loved her performance.

The entire cast performed admirably. I absolutely adored it. And SRK, a charismatic cameo ( playing a scientist called Mohan Bhargava). He is on screen for every minute, which is excellent. There is yelling and applause. It's wonderful to see how much SRK is adored. The Nandi Bail superpower of Nagarjuna also struck viewers as one of the coolest sights they'd ever seen on a big screen. Despite the fact that he doesn't have much to do with the plot, his character nonetheless manages to look cool and receive enthusiastic applause from the audience whenever he appears on screen. After seeing Mouni Roy, I have become her fan for sure, and it was a wise choice to cast her as this sinisterly cool baddie. If you possessed superhuman abilities, you would want to kill her since she captured her so effectively.

It is definitely entertaining and worth watching. Ayan Mukharji is credited with taking Indian cinema to a new level. His plotting and direction are remarkable. This VFX-heavy film surpasses all others from Bollywood.

Ab itni angreji parh ke kya karoge bey, logout karo & lapak ke book karo tickets, Enjoy karo.

Visual effects were decent on screen yes it was marvel-esque, so don’t know how many people will like that, but the cinematic experience was good.

Superb cinematography too!

Edit: adding a few extra points i forgot:

Background score and music top notch and also the choreography and presentation of songs. The final moments of dance ka Bhoot song were epic. 
Performance wise Amitabh Bachchan was much better than the rest.

Junoon was OK in parts. 

Her sidekicks though not menacing at all. Needed more work on the villains.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!! 

The love story is not great, you don’t feel the instant connection with them, and you can see they are really trying to sell the soulmates at first sight trope, but we can see the desperate attempt and it falls flat and feels forced, only saw their chemistry in patches and that doesn’t work for the story.

The character of Isha in the whole film seems pointless, even with her being a trigger to his powers is not felt, it should’ve been connected to  his mother instead. Mouni has a meatier role than Alia. Also her performance is pretty average, so far she has only done it with well written and fleshed out characters, the reason why I always stop from calling her truly great because the actresses in the 90’s were convincing the audience even with shittier written roles.

Some were saying Alia will probably have a better role in the next one but with, people are saying Deepika is the one representing jalastra, and with the story being about Dev will she really have anything great to do?

Dialogues are cringy as f***, Amitabh’s performance and delivery saved it in his scenes actually he was the best part of the movie, unfortunately SRK’s dialogues were cringe and he couldn’t save those, although his presence was enjoyable for those few minutes. Dimple Kapadia literally had a two minute role I think she only had one dialogue… I’m thinking these actors like Dimple and Nagarjuna are going to have bigger parts in the next one or I don’t know why the hell they spent all that money on their fees for few minute appearances, when it could’ve been done with any actor.

I saw Ranbir’s effort, felt like he was convincing as Shiva.

The Astras history or introduction is only talked about at the beginning, i wish there was a way to flesh that out. In later parts we just saw very quick glimpses of them.

The movie was alright, my expectations were a bit too high, but I am so happy it has got a good opening whether it sustains is to be seen but I am happy BoycottBollywood gang didn’t succeed in their nonsense. 

also… my poor tenzing

Saw the movie and it was above average maybe a 3/5.

Good -

The vfx (pretty awesome for a Bollywood movie)

The background score (For shiva’s character) and the songs in general 

The world building (to some extent)*

Amitabh Bachchan.

Mouni (she got a good role and delivered) I don’t like her much but I guess she worked hard for this one.

Bad -

The dialogues. OmG who writes such cringey dialogues. It’s very silly. None of the characters - the leads, the supporting cast or special appearance actors - can make it work. 

The love story felt forced. There is no connect and it takes up so much time-  Time that they could have used to show the world building more *

Exposition - too much voiceover. “Show don’t tell” is what they should do instead of Amitabh’s character shoving exposition after exposition at us.

Some disconnect in character motivation and action.

*spoilers*
Characters who could have lended a hand at the final battle just go away for no reason. All those guardians just vanish when they should have stayed and fought against the dark forces. They left the kids party behind.

the intro to the love story is also cringe. All the sidey characters also disappear all of a sudden. Shiva and Isha falling that deeply in love in 1 meet doesn’t make any sense - on paper or on screen.

Ps - since they wanted to build on mythology I think they could have used more Sanskrit shlokas and poems etc in the background music ( which already exists. No need to even think of lyrics). Eg the shiva strotam used in “kaun hai woh” song or the Sanskrit part of “dheevara” song where the hero’s ascent is likened to that of Hanuman’s in bb1- it’s so powerful it stays with you. Something like that was missing - would have enhanced the viewing experience even more. 

My Brahmastra Review

Before I start the review, I would like to confess that I went in as a huge supporter of this film mainly due to its genre. Indian mythology punched with VFX is dope for me as I am huge fan of Marvel movies.

Brahmastra is an avant-garde theatrical experience  , first of its kind , a promising never seen before visual spectacle derailed by clunky writing, uninspired screenplay and horrific dialogues. Yet, there's so much to appreciate, the effort and dedication shines through and lets be honest, far lesser films have minted money at the BO. Brahmastra should work because its not dull or boring despite its glaring flaws.Overall, its neither terrible not superior, but deserves a chance.

The film begins with the cameo of my favourite superstar(by now even the ants on your sofa know this, so definitely not a spoiler). He sets the fantastical tone of the film perfectly,he's so charming and witty, that you demand him more. By now, we are also introduced to the Astraverse by Amitji's masterful voice-over.

Next, we see the film's hero, a gareeb horcruxy Mumbai ka DJ with Mr Indiaish past who gets flashes of live events happening somewhere else much like our favourite Harry Puttar. He instantly falls in love with the myserious looking rich london returned Isha( Alas! She is not mysterious at all). The problem begins right here ! The love story is so unncessary and juvenile that it just doesnt fit in Ayan's universe which he creates with so much care. Isha is a glorified flowerpot who has repetitive dialogues like "Kaun ho tum Shiva" , "Mujhse sach kyun chupaya" , "Main tumhari pyaar mein kab ki jal gayi". I have to confess here that I waited for Alia's big character reveal till the last 4 seconds of the film but NO! She remained the annoying girlfriend till the end who had to be saved all the godamn time! All she did was scream "Shiva". This is majorly a writing flaw. So much could have been better if Alia had her own superpower apart from activating Shiva's Agniastra. Anyway, a jobless Isha immediately( we never know what she does for a living, maybe nothing?) join's Shiva in his newly found quest for saving the guardians of Brahmastra which take them to Varanasi(btw, the girl had just met him for like what? twice and she was okay to risk her life). At this point, the supporter in me was unsettled but I was still like "theek hai chalo, afterall its a bollywood movie, we should not forget that" . Anyway, they reach varanasi and sing Kesariya(a surprise is there!) and then enters Nagarjuna! The subsequent sequences of the trio evading the Dark force led by a sexy Junoon and her bandarmen (extremely useless with no impact whatsoever, again bad writing!) and their escape to Guru's ashram with a fantastic car chase sequence is my favourite part of this film. Especially, the Nandi-Astra reveal and the entire fight sequence. Magnificently done! The supporter in me squealed in excitement!  Then comes the pre-interval sequence which was extraordinary and the supporter in me started dancing!I was like YAY! Ayan has done it!

Then comes the second half! Enters Mr Bachchan as Brahmansh ka Guruji with his baritone voice and a paternal presence! I have to admit that even though we have seen Mr Bachchan play these roles to the T many times, I had no complaints. Guruji became Shiva's guide and our encyclopedia to the world of Astraverse! I don't know about others but I thoroughly enjoyed this part of the movie where new characters with different astras like pavan-astra, Nag-Dhanush, Gajastra were revealed. Even though these characters are not fleshed out, I enjoyed the light-hearted moments of Shiva's training at the ashram(while Isha was away) until he fully realized his potential. It was breezy and aided with the fantastic Deva - Deva song.

Now comes the Achilles heel, the third Act which ruined the movie for me to a large extent. While Shiva was training, Junoon gained more powers from her deity Brahm-Dev(Not speaking much about him as its a spoiler) and gathered an army near the Ashram. They have only one motive and that's the "Brahmastra". 

That's it! Within the next 10 minutes, there's too much of information about Shiva's parents, characters are comically placed next to each other in screenplay and there's forced fireworks! I mean Junoon and Guruji come face to face like a theatre show is happening in a closed auditorium! Hilarious and heart-breaking at the same time. Then quickly, there's an attack from Junoon's men clad in Black robes and voila! We see an overlong, boring battle which is supposedly the climax of the film! I have never seen a longer climax than this film! It goes on and on and on with VFX overdose and jarring sound effects and just when I thought its over, the climax continues with renewed VFX assualt with one thing remaining constant : Alia playing the damsel in distress.By the time the movie ended , I was exhausted and gasping for breathThe supporter in me had sank without a trace! I was like why? The execution could have been so much better! Why no one from the team pointed out these glaring flaws in writing/screenplay to Ayan or karan in these past 10 years? The dialogues throughout the film are abysmal and again I have the same question .. Why?

The VFX is the only department which is great! There's infact an overdose! If the action sequences had more finesse and less CGI then they would have been more impactful I guess! There's no emotional gravitas to the characters, I couldn't care less about Shiva-Isha love story. I did not understand why they fell in love apart from the fact that they are RaLia? I did not understand why Dimple kapadia whizzeled in and out of the frames?

Coming to the performances, Ranbir has the greatest character arc and he does well! He did look haggard in some scenes but most probably its because he had already become 37-38 by the time the film completed its shooting. He's earnest and does well with the green screen sequences! Alia is luminous, looks great but is given an annoying/thankless role which had the scope of hamming and she gave in bits and parts! Both have been saddled with cheesy dialogues which made the supporter in me feel like running away and hide my face somewhere in the dark! Nagarjuna does great with his character, terrific screen presence! Amit Ji was first rate :) just perfect. Mouni Roy was terrific in the film. Infact , she looked her part the most and was menacing throughout. I have problem with the people who are judging her because of her TV background. Just look at her as an actor in the film and not judge her because of her past and then rate her performance! There's nothing to comment on the Ashram kids, they had no presence. 

The music is expectedly good, the BGM is also good but jarring in parts. Overall, I liked 3/4th of the movie overlooking the writing/screenplay/dialogue flaws. But this movie is not terrible as the samosa critics without payment are saying. Far lesser films have worked at the BO before. I would be highly disappointed if this doesnt work because it will mean, we will be deluged with more pushpa's and KGF's. Why no one judges the misogyny and crassness of those movies? If those movies can make 1000 crores then Brahmastra with its flaws should atleast make 500!

Review has plenty of spoilers

All the actors looked their best in the movie and were presented well (apart from Mouni because of her character and lips). The Songs were amazing especially kesariya. It’s cool that Shiva can read minds and gets dreams of brahmastra even when he is awake. I liked srk’s role it was about 30mins length I hope we get more scenes of him in the next movies. Shiva fell in love with isha so easily and isha agreed to go with him/ trusted him easily, not enough progression of feelings shown. Dadu was a funny character. Some dialogues were funny. Isha keeps saying tum ho kaun in the first half and Shiva told her everything in his heart quickly.

First half was mindblowing apart from the many deaths. In the 2nd half Shiva remembers his mother’s death. In the second half I liked ranbir amitabh, fire and talking about amrita scenes most.

Zor and Junoon want Brahmastra. Junoon is doing it to resurrect dev her guru. Junoon has a Stone and a guru too (dev).

 Brahmansh protect astras this includes guru ji (and ashram senior citizens). Isha is Shiva’s button to become agni. Pyar vs darr shakti bit was nice. Amrita (likely to be Deepika) is Ranbir’s mother in the movie 😂 Shiva found the third part from Amrita’s (his mother’s) shell. Most of the vfx was good apart from when shiva wore the necklace or when junoon’s face changed. Alia was okay apart from the crying scene when tenzin fell. Isha’s kaun ho tum was repetitive and she wasn’t really needed in the second half except for the last 25mins (before the final face off). The ending about love was sweet. I wanted to know who will play dev.

Ranbir, Amitabh and Mouni were great. Alia was okay but Aloobir chemistry was a bit off. The film is a nice watch something different but 2nd part could be slightly better. I liked it more than Taran said though. I am a fan of Ayaan films. 

My overall review is that it's a one time watch. It's entertaining with its VFX without inducing RaOne type headache. And it does set a decent base for the next ones. I'm actually excited about the 2nd part. Dev and Amrita's story. But it's one of those movies which you might only enjoy on the big screen. Online/OTT pe you might find it below average coz the VFX doesn't impact you that much then. So watch it in theatres. Switch to your mobiles during the 'Love storiyan' and you should be fine 😎

Detailed rant below. Kafi lamba hai toh read at your own risk(Coz discuss krne ko koi hai nahi aas paas😆) : 

The good : 

* The concept obviously, its new as per the usual BW standards and it's interesting. If people are making a hue and cry about this not being able to match MCU/DC then the joke is on them. We shouldn't compare it with HW but instead the movies BW has been churning out. And this was obviously a step in the right direction and just increased BW's level. Koi 0 to 100 sidhe nahi hota. Even if it's 0 to 20, it's progress and hopefully will get better progressively. Haan churaya hai Avengers n Harry Potter se but utna chalta hai filhal. 

* VFX : Some of the Astras were just chef's kiss. Vanar Astra and Nandi Astra looked so good on the big screen. That scene where we get a glimpse of Amrita with water in the background as well as Dev's statue thingy, again such great visual delight. RK channeling his power and creating that Trishul 🔥

* Entertaining : Yes, it was very entertaining even with its mistakes. If nothing then atleast a one-time watch in the theatre. Plus, I saw most of the audience around me had theories and discussions once it ended about Amrita, Dev, what could have happened, what should have happened, etc etc. So this movie's universe stays with you as an audience. 

* Senior actors and their screen presence : SRK, Nagarjuna, AB. When these guys use their Astra you can actually see the power/aggression in their body language. Made it so believable. Especially when Nagarjuna and SRK use their Astras at full capacity. Wish they had more role to play in the story. I was way more interested in their scenes than the 'leads'. 

* Dev and Amruta's story : Way more excited for them than the lead couple. Here's to hoping Ayan gets the right feedback and makes their story better. Just like Bahubali 2 has way better storyline and world building than Bahubali 1. Can't wait for Deepu in her Amrita getup 🔥. I really wish they cast RS as Dev but I guess it will be RK playing double role. Coz RK vs RS toh krenge nhi last mein. So it will be RK vs RK. 

* BGM : Loved it in the crucial scenes. They have done a tremendous job with the BGM music. Especially when the good guys channel their power in max mode. Goosebumps worthy moments. 

* Villains actually doing their job : Puri movie mein if there was someone who was truly focused towards their goal then it was the Villain's team. Matlab zero distractions or mistakes. Starting se end tak they are on track. Inka aur kahi dhyan nhi tha unlike the 'Good guys'. Mouni nails her part. She's menacing and shows the right amount of aggression. 1-2 scenes mein toh she actually gives you chills when she appears on screen. 

The bad/cringe/ugggh worthy things :

* Dialogues : Let's start with the gems. 'Light uss roshni ka naam hai' scene went on for like 5 mins. Puri light ki definition di gyi hai usme (which had no relation to the actual definition of light). And then you have AB explaining RK how inorder to harness his power he needs to find his own 'Button'. Repeatedly the word 'button'  is used. It was so cringe. Aur koi batao inko button on off nhi hota, press hota hai. Switch on off hota hai. Kaun ho tum/Kya hi tum is on loop in the first half. 😆. Not one dialogue stays with you (in a good way) . Remember how Bahubali had 'Mera vachan hi shasan hai', 'Kaat te hain uska gala' and more recently 'Main jhukega nahi saala' from Pushpa? Yeah, this one doesn't have one swag worthy dialogue. Wo toh chodo, normal dialogues are so pathetic, SRK, a scientist is given 'Tu hathi nhi genda hai'. AB goes 'Pyar se bada koi Astra nahi', 'Main tumhe DJ se Dragon bana dunga'. RK toh gets absolutely garbage, chhapri level dialogues. 

* Dumb use of Astras : SRK is against 2 humans when he is using his Astra but he doesn't kill or even hurt his enemies. Same Astra when the villain uses does so much damage. Same with Nagarjuna. Uska ek truck girane mein hi ho jata hai kaam while once the villain has this Astra, he's almost invincible. Itne log (all. with Astras) mil kr nhi maar paa rhe usko. Same with the others. Itne powerful hain ye Astra and you are killing the villain's army one by one? Bhai fir kya training mil rahi thi uss ashram mein. 

Sabko romantic songs sikha rhe ho kya training camp mein coz kaam toh aa nhi raha kuch. 

Random screenplay : Super serious scenes ko bich mein cut krke randomly Aloo-RK kuchi kooing. Thrill maintain krne ka mood hi nhi tha Ayaan ka. 

Romance track n songs + Leads being dumb : 🤢. So cringe worthy and juvenile. 2 min ki Maggi noodles wali love story. These two have met twice and Aloo goes all 'Shiva ka sath Parvati toh degi'.  

Other gems include (these are all different scenes):

RK-Aloo are on their way to save Nagarjuna in Kashi coz they know Mouni is going to kill him, par Kashi pahuch ke they spend entire day boating and singing Kesariya. Toh kya hua if a team of murderers are on their way to murder him.  2 din pehle mili Aloo k sath Gaana gana is more important. 

Nagarjuna has just died like 5 mins before par fir RK-Aloo ko I love you bolna hai khushi khushi, sharmate hue. It was like two parallel universes going on. 

Saale duniya khatm hone ki baat ho rhi hai, AB is trying to recruit RK and he's like 'Mujhe nhi padna iss sab mein coz mere paas tum ho Isha'. 

Randomly RK decides to wear something Mouni's foot soldier was wearing in his neck. Matlab ekdum randomly. It's not like that stone was calling out to him or anything. And that gives Mouni a chance to see RK's thought and guess their location. 

They know now the Ashram is not safe and Mouni is going to attack, everyone decides to shift base. But guess what we have time for RK showing his fire show to Aloo. Mast nachte-gaate hue, like a magic show.  Banda ki priority is just f*ck all. 

Mouni now has 2 pieces of Brahmastra, 3rd is with RK. He drops it while fighting, its still in the grass inside the ring of fire he created around him n Aloo. He decides to step outside his ring of fire so to distract the enemies from aloo. Doesn't even think about taking the 3rd piece with him. Matlab bhai puri ladai uss 3rd piece ke liye ho rhi hai, duniya khatm ho jayegi, kaha hai iss admi ki priority. 

Aloo threatens Mouni to drop her weapons or she would throw BA into a khai n Mouni obeys. Matlab Mouni khud khai mein gir ke wapas aa chuki hai. She has n number of powers & can turn 100s into her soldiers and you are telling me she can't find the BA from a khai. Kya mazak hai ye?

Do you really have to show such dumb things to move the plot forward?  

*Lead couple's acting : Almost felt like both Aloo-RK weren't even trying. Itni flat dialogue delivery, itni cringe acting. It's been a while since I've last seen an RK movie, but aisi performance? There's no aggression or force in his body language when he uses his power. You don't even feel like he's actually channeling it unlike SRK/Nagarjuna or even the villain's stooges. No seriousness, it's like Wake up Sid/YJHD wale character ko Brahmastra universe mein le aye hain. In de scenes, he randomly tilts his head staring at the screen/camera. You'll think he's about to get a vision or something with the way he's staring, but nothing. Bas aise hi khada hai wo Ajay Devgan jaisa. 

Alia is horrible as well. The way she delivers the dialogues is like she's reciting a poem. Wanted to skip the scenes as soon as she starts speaking in the 2nd half. And that Chikni Chameli bit😆RK does a better CC than her. 

Overall really poor and cringe worthy performance by both of them. Aloo's character wasn't even needed. The button thing anyways didn't make sense. She was just a liability through and through but man has she been given supreme importance for no reason whatsoever. 

VFX keeps the attention away from them most of the times though so... 

(Also, Aloo actually looks good in terms of looks next to RK. He was looking very weird, especially in the first half) 

* Pathetic climax : Last 5 mins were just f*ckall. Bhakk. 

* Funny bits:

Mouni's lips during the last fight were so distracting 🤣. You can notice them changing throughout the movie.

There's also KJo's special appearance in the movie : Nag Astra 😆

I actually thought for a minute that Mouni was going to burst after she joined the parts. Man, that would have been an epic scene 🤣

Aloo touching RK when he's legit on fire and then showing shock at her hands getting burnt was peak TSTL behaviour 😆

Chawl wala, orphan, DJ RK is gareeb but has a  coffee machine. #ShaukBadiCheezHai 😆

IMO AB should have just killed RK. Jab wo hota hi nhi toh 3rd part of the Astra kabhi kisi ko milta nhi since it required his blood to appear in its form. Safe forever. Harry Potter se itna copy kia hi tha toh they should have copied Dumbledore raising Harry to sacrifice him in the end wala part as well. Pagle log, faltu itna effort waste kr dia. 😆

#RantOver for now. Insert Hansa's 'Main toh thank gyi bhaisaab' gif here 😆