O Romeo Review: Vishal Bhardwaj turns Shahid Kapoor into magnificent Ustara to tell a tale of love and fury

Imagine Gong Yu, slowly stripping for you in a darkened theatre. Frame-mogging anyone or anything that shows up. Imagine Shah Rukh Khan just leaning against a car, smiling at you while the coffee in your hand just turns into apricot blossoms floating around you. Or whoever you’re thinking of right this moment when you’re reading this - that someone who deserves all the cat videos you’ve been saving for that one day when you will send it to him.

Vishal Bhardwaj makes the most awesome music. A background score that is as flawless as the songs, and yes, should Stephen Spielberg watch this film, he’d be eating his hat and regretting remaking West Side Story. This movie is that good. It is a musical, so I have to start with that. But it’s not some mindless ‘story is stuck so song daal do’ type of a film.

Yes, the director had help, from Shakespeare himself, so the story does not disappoint. But it’s smarter than that. It’s cooler than the anime version (Romeo X Juliet), which I have always believed to be better than anything Bollywood has tried to pass off as their version.

Shahid Kapoor as Ustara (an old-fashioned shaving blade used by old-fashioned barbers) cuts through all the crap that passes off as ‘hai kya mohobbat hai’ on screen to lure the gram bait kids to the theatres. Gulzar’s version of the eternal favourite drunken song ‘Neeche Paan Ki Dukaan’ with Shahid Kapoor dancing is so good, like me, you would forgive him for showing up late at the premiere of Marty Supreme and making junta wait and wait and wait for his little presentation of the film! Shahid Kapoor is also me when I imagine cutting the enemies I have made over the years, knowing that killing is not an easy thing. Once you kill a man, the bloodlust takes over your being. But he also says that ‘I took on the supari to kill them myself’ because, love. And this film is an ode to our propensity for violence as well as love.

Shahid and his crew live on an abandoned boat, and everything seems to be okay with his badmash world - he gets an order to kill, and he does it - until a girl asks him, “What is your rate per person?”

Tripti Dimri has had us all fascinated since she appeared in Bulbbul. This time, she’s keeping roza and yet has thoughts of revenge in her heart. Not just Vikrant Massey, but we too are blowing her kisses, hoping Aruna Irani’s bait for Ustara, the incandescent Julie the dancer (Disha Patani), will be gone from Ustara’s head and replaced with Afshan. The moment Tripti Dimri asked the Indian cowboy, “Per person rate kya hai?” made me fall in love with her. The rest, as they say, is a movie you cannot miss.

If you have grown up watching with your jaw on the floor - Madhuri Dixit seducing Anil Kapoor - then the version of the song in this film will blow your mind. It’s pure Semtex. And for some reason, when Nana Patekar (yes, he’s in the film too!) says, there’s a ‘Ganjon ki fauj’ I heard in Gabbar Singh’s voice.

Speaking of flashbacks, the songs that Visha Bhardwaj uses in the film rival the use of Hindi film music in the monstrous hit Dhurandhar. It is so good!

A huge salute to Ustara’s crew

I don’t know the names of the actors in Ustara’s crew, but a huge salute to all of them. The scene where we are introduced to them and the scene where they cry because Ustara is crying, they deserve all kinds of accolades.

But seeing Rahul Deshpande as an evil cop who sings classical music is a casting coup, if I may say so. His description of a wife should be mandatory for every new aspirant on Seema Aunty’s matchmaking show. A bouquet of roses for you, sir!

Speaking of roses, do notice the recurring theme of the flowers everywhere - from the poster on the wall to dupattas, and yes, on the stylish, partially bald head of the evilest-of-evil men played by Avinash Tiwary. Uff! Creepily evil matador who kills a bull in the corrida as easily as he kills people. He makes for one of the best antagonists, even though his actions are a tad predictable.

Bullfighting is an art best left for history, in my opinion, but Vishal Bhardwaj knows what he’s doing when he forces us to watch. He’s not mincing his words about what he does not like, and presents it so subtly, you will miss it. But I’m fresh from watching the noon chai stall in Lyarai town in Dhurandhar and what it is named, so I’m watching the film keenly. This film is not about the traditional rivalry between the Capulets and the Montagues, where both Romeo and Juliet die for love. This is not love where a Preppie falls in love with a hippie (remember Ryan O’Neal and Ali MacGraw) who made every love story about never having to say you’re sorry… This is a bullet for bullet, blood shed for bloodshed in a choreographed symphony written by Ravel and R D Burman…

You are not going to call your love my Soju shot any more. This Supari Jaan will make you melt like dalgona coffee in Mumbai heat. Lads, be careful what Vishal Bhardwaj defines as love in the film that releases right in time for Valentine’s Day.

Do not skip the ‘why-are-we-seeing-so-much-sensuality’ and ‘Hollywood is always so tactile’ love story about the upper-class Catharine and lowbrow Heathcliff. The Bronte sisters occupy a place in the writer’s pantheon for a reason. But you cannot miss Ustara’s, “I’m going to cut her out of my life by tearing every piece of my flesh”. Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi are sensational in Wuthering Heights, but you will be haunted by Ananya Wadkar’s voice on Tripti Dimri singing a love song in the night on a boat. Gulzar’s anthem for love in Arijit Singh’s voice this year is, ‘Hum toh tere hi liye thay, tere hi liye toh hain, jahan bhi yaad kar le, waheen pe toh khade hain.’

P.S. Seeing Tamannah Bhatia do the Ophelia in O Romeo is the best homage to Romeo X Juliet that I have seen. In the Anime classic Ophelia, who appears in Shakespeare's Hamlet, is in the anime series as the caretaker of the great tree Escalus... Just another brilliant bit from Vishal Bhardwaj.

Manisha Lakhe is a freelance writer with Mint. She writes on movies, shows, travel, and more.