15/10/2022
Not carved into packs but built up like a giant, his eyes peep out of a forest of facial hair, lips drown in a desi ale of sorts. From afar he is a monster and up close, a man-child, waiting to be tamed with a soother.
The world is scared of his shadow, but to the one he means the word, he is the light in the sky, the sparkle in the eyes, of the prettiest woman in the neighbourhood, who is always there to balm his bruises. The bruises are there for fighting evil, for vengeance, for slashing hoards in seconds, for crushing skulls with a punch, for choosing arms over weapons for the enemy is often not worthy.
What might seem like a page out of Rocky from KGF action drama is actually a scene out of Bilal Lashari’s The Legend of Maula Jatt (TLoMJ) with a lot more devotion to sense than its South Asian parallels. While the overall choice of shots, some sequences and even editing are reminiscent more of Lashari’s love for anime, it is the strange ageing process that TLoMJ has gone through that it now stands, neck to neck, with Rajmoulie and Prashanth league of cinema, at least for the desi audiences.
