Drona – another superhero bites the dust, well, atleast in Bollywood. Goldie Behl’s supernatural fantasy adventure after 7 years of draught turns out to be a disaster. Goldie Behl’s (Sonali Bendre’s husband) directed Abhishek Bachchan way back in 2001 in ‘Bas Itna Sa Khwab hai’- a movie that disappeared off the movie theatres even before the ink on its posters dried. Abhishek Bachchan hasn’t learned the basic of business – never mix friendship with business. Drona matches Goldie’s earlier escapade, it’s disastrous.

For starters, I was never convinced Abhishek Bachchan fitted the bill as a superhero. He just doesn’t have the psyche, physique or the temperament to be a superhero, applying layers of Kohl under one’s eye is not convincing enough.

The movie starts off with the history of Drona – a legacy of sword wielding warriors guarding amrut ( secret of immortality) from the bad element of this world. Drona is potrayed on-screen as a cluless, totally aimless character (played by Abhishek Bachchan) wanders about looking sad and dull, unaware of the fact that he has supernaturual powers. To spice things up Mr Behl introduces another character in his story, Ms Priyanka Chopra whose sole purpose in life is to safeguard the life of Drona, she saves him from the clutches of a clowny Riz Raizada (played by Kay Kay Menon).

This is followed by wasteful demonstration of Riz’s powers, the ultimate realization that Aditya is indeed the warrior Drona, some unnecessary songs and romance and some OK combat sequences. The movie has not much to talk about, the music is not worth talking about, the direction is but ordinary, it seems the movie is a hotchpotch of special effects inspired (most commonly used word in Bollywood) by the likes of The Mummy.

Performance-wise Abhishek is non-convincing in his role as a super-hero, Priyanka does manage to give a few good glamorous shot but the one character that sticks out like a sore thumb is of Kay Kay Menon, his is one of the most annoying and embarrassing performance of the year, in comparison even Tushar Kapoor’s annoying character in Golmaal looks glorified. Well, the least said about Drona, the better.

Drona has drawn in poor initial response at the theatres and with the reviews pouring in its doubtful that this movie will survive long, sources suggest that Abhishek watched Drona this movie 50 times over, I’m sure each time he saw, he would have questioned his judgement about doing this movie. It was another failure for Priyanka Chopra after Chamku, God Tussi Great Ho and Love story 2050; hope Fashion and Dostana salvages her sagging career.

Anyways coming to the gossips associated with Drona, it appears that for the premier of this movie Bachchan junior invited Shahrukh Khan and family – does it indicate that the cold war between the Khans and the Bachchans is over? Inidentally, he also invited the Karishma and Kareena Kapoor to the premier, are we seeing the two of the biggest bollywood families bridging gaps again?

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