'Sadak 2' REVIEW: Alia Bhatt, Sanjay Dutt's Film Falls Flat, Turns Out To Be Snooze Fest

'Sadak 2' review: The film starring Alia Bhatt, Sanjay Dutt and Aditya Roy Kapur has failed on not one but all the important parameters.

Mahesh Bhatt’s ‘Sadak 2’ has been hogging all the limelight for not so good reasons ever since the film’s trailer was unveiled. The trailer of ‘Sadak 2’ has become the most disliked video on YouTube. The action drama premiered directly on Disney+ Hotstar on August 28. Despite boasting of talented performers like Alia Bhatt, Sanjay Dutt and Jisshu Sengupta, the movie fails to keep you engaged and retain your attention. To begin with, ‘Sadak 2’ is marred with several problems including lackluster plot, unappealing screenplay. Mahesh Bhatt, who has a great body of work, made his comeback after 20 years with the film. However, he couldn’t replicate his magic in ‘Sadak 2’ because of lazy writing and film's slow nature. There will be times when you will like to skip a few scenes due to the dull moments. The characters aren’t developed enough to be satisfying to the audience. In short, poor character development coupled with patchy writing made the film a snooze fest. The storyline is woven around the character of Aarya (Alia), an heiress on the run, who is on a mission to expose the fake gurus. She compels Ravi Kishore, a suicidal taxi driver to take her to Kailash on her 21^st birthday to fulfil her late mother’s last wish. From launching an online campaign to burning ‘Dhongi Baba’ Gyan Prakash’s (Makarand Deshpande) effigy at his aashram, Aarya does everything but still fails to capture your attention. You don’t feel a spark in her character, despite turbulence in her life. She falls in love with a troll, Vishal (Aditya Roy Kapur), who has a shady past. When you have Alia Bhatt and Aditya Roy Kapur, you can expect some chemistry, isn’t it? But it was completely missing. All through the first half, I wondered why Aditya is even in the film. He looked more like a prop in the film as all the heroism was displayed by Sanjay Dutt’s character Ravi. The music was also not up to the mark. Considering Vishesh Films have churned out some of the biggest musical tracks in their films, ‘Sadak 2’ songs turned out to be a disappointment.

The makers wasted a talent like Makarand Deshpande as there wasn’t much scope in his character. The self-proclaimed godman Gyan Prakash only sat on his throne and flaunted his gold bangles in ‘Sadak 2’. Except a face-off with Ravi Kishore (Sanjay Dutt), Makarand hardly had anything to do in the film. Sanjay Dutt played the role of Ravi with full sincerity and deserves praises for his portrayal of a hopeless man, who talks with his deceased wife about their reunion after death.  Alia Bhatt, who is regarded as one of the talented actors of younger generation, couldn’t do much in her first film with her father. The ‘Kalank’ actress got a heavy monologue in the end but she couldn’t leave an impression. 'Sadak 2' is arguably Alia's weakest performance till date. ‘Sadak 2’ failed on all the parameters including direction, writing, acting music, dialogues. Watch the film at your own risk.