Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra\u2019s film has high ambition but dodges complexity in favour of overheated melodrama<\/p>\n
Partly set in the Mumbai underworld, Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra\u2019s boxing drama aims at Raging Bull grit but has an unfortunately irresistible drift towards late-Rocky melodrama. Farhan Akhtar \u2013 in his second sporting collaboration with Mehra after the 2013 biopic<\/a> of sprinter Milkha Singh<\/a> \u2013 plays Aziz Ali, orphan and now burly debt collector from the hard-knock port of Dongri. After patching him up a few too many times, winsome but no-nonsense doctor Ananya (Mrunal Thakur) approves when he starts unleashing the beast down at the boxing gym run by fearsome coach Nana Prabhu (Paresh Rawal). A couple of training montages later, and Aziz is a light-heavyweight contender, with his very own snappy moniker: Toofaan (\u201cstorm\u201d in Hindi).<\/p>\n With his mop of curly hair and slugger\u2019s arms, Akhtar has a dry, easy charm, like an Indian Tom Jones, and impressively lets his weight fluctuate, De Niro-style, during the course of the film according to Aziz\u2019s condition. Despite this discipline, and the rough and tumble street setting, Toofaan doesn\u2019t fully commit to on-your-feet realism; it keeps one foot in high masala movie heroism, with a sentimental and moralistic sweep that stops it grappling with any complexities. More than once, Ananya makes everything simple for Aziz, and us, by holding up two fingers: \u201cWill you be the Aziz hiding from the world? Or will you be the Storm that\u2019ll rise again?\u201d<\/p>\n