Producer: Shobha Kapoor, Ektaa Kapoor & Sony Pictures Networks
Director: Tony D’Souza
Star Cast: Emraan Hashmi, Prachi Desai, Nargis Fakhri, Lara Dutta, Gautam Gulati, Manjot Singh, Rajesh Chaudhary, Varun Badola, Kulbhushan Kharbanda & Kunal Roy Kapur
Music: Pritam & Amal Mallik
After making damp squib films like Blue & Boss director Tony D’Souza is in full form in Azhar. He has made a very heart warming film by laying bare most of the controversial facets of the legendary cricketer Mohammed Azharuddin.
The plotted scenario of Azhar throws light on the life & times of Azhar (Emraan Hashmi) and his marriage with Naureen (Prachi Desai), his 1st wife and of course on his personal relationship with Bollywood actress Sangeeta Bijlani (Nargis Fakhri) who later on become his 2nd wife. But the film is more of an effort to clear his name from the 3 match fixing scandals in which he was dragged in for no fault of his own. But then Azhar being Azhar he fights for justice in court in a long drawn out court proceedings with his long time friend Reddy (Kunal Roy Kapur) as the defense lawyer and his die – hard fan from London namely Meera (Lara Dutta)
as the public prosecutor. Needless to say that Azhar wins the long drawn out court battle of 12 years till he succeeds in clearing his defamed name and regains his honour & respect in the eyes of his millions of fans.
Director Tony D’souza’s Azhar brilliantly captures the angst, the simplicity, the colossal success, the dual romance, the tryst with infamy and an arduous innings of never ending struggle – to – clear – the – name of Indian cricket’s heroic, yet arguably the most controversial captain Mohammad Azharuddin. A special well – deserved mention should also be made of Shobha Kapoor, Ektaa Kapoor & Sony Pictures Networks for backing this project. Besides hats of to all the behind the scenes man for their over all competence like writer Rajat Arora, music composers Pritam & Amal Mallik, cinematographer Rakesh Singh, editor Tushar Shivam et al.
Performance wise it is an Emraan Hashmi film from “The Start” till “The End”. Emraan has really sunk his teeth into the skin of Mohammed Azharuddin’s character to the extent of getting Azhar’s typical mannerisms & body language right. This is Emraan’s career best performance. He literally captures the spirit & the soul of Mohammed Azharuddin. Prachi Desai is delightful as the simple Naureen and acts with a lot of heart. Nargis Fakhri is a visual delight as a glam doll. Kunal Roy Kapoor as the bumbling lawyer friend is a major highlight of the film. He ensures genuine comical moments in spite of retaining the seriousness of certain key moments in the film. Lara Dutta is in top form as the no – nonsense prosecution lawyer. Kulbhushan Kharbanda as Azhar’s grandfather shines in a cameo. But the film makes blatant mockery of the other Indian Cricketers by presenting their characters very shabbily and the poor victims were actors like Gautam Gulati & Varun Badola portraying the roles of Ravi Shashtri
& Kapil Dev respectively.
Tail Piece: Azhar is a not to be missed heart touching movie
