Dushmani: A Violent Love Story

We write reviews looking at other movies but you have to think of the 90s. I remember watching this in the 90s it was a good movie then and it is now now

This is a very good movie from the late 90s. Jackie Shroff as Jai, and Anupam Kher as Oberoi take the cake. You.literally hate Kher for his kameenapanti. Deepti Naval is also good.in the screen time she has

So many scenes without logic. Sunny Deol chooses to fight with the goons instead of taking his friend to hospital. The make up and hair do of Sunny and Jackie changes every other scene which means the movie was completed in later after major chunk was shot first. Sunny Deol who's is terrific in his dialogue delivery in movies like Ghatak, Damini and Ghayal is not given any meaningful dialogues. The movie could have be decent with some slick editing and proper reason between two enemies. It's very difficult to understand the reason for hate - there's no strong point anywhere in the plot. 1995 marked the end of action movies. The romantic era began with Shah Rukh from 1996 onwards. Nevertheless, we missed Sunny's powerful performances until Gadar happened.

The film began with Shekhar Kapur as sole director and ended up being completed by three directors, all having different sensibilities and levels of talent. The end result is a patchy film, with many continuity issues. Also, the lead actors looked different across the duration of the film due to delays.

The only redeeming factor for this mess of a film is Anand-Milind's superb musical score, particularly the qawali, Mera Salaam (Kumar Sanu, Udit Narayan, Kavita Krishnamurthy), Banno Teri Ankhiyan (Sapna Avasti) and my favorite, Kabhi Hanste Hain (S. P. Balasubramanyam and Kavita Krishnamurthy). Shekhar Kapur had a keen year for music and that has been proven with all his films - finished or unfinished by him.

Performance wise, Sunny Deol was a little inconsistent, confused between the romantic track and the action sequences. Jackie Shroff appears earnest but his character wasn't as fleshed out as one would have liked it to be. Manisha Koirala signed this film when she was fresh out of Saudagar and looks beautiful. Anupam Kher was okay, as was Deepti Naval.

Overall, the film looks dated, patchy, incomplete and amateurish. Music aside, nothing to write about.

Dushmani review :

Shekhar Kapur's incomplete film which was much delayed and finally completed by three other directors - writer Karan Razdan, Sanjay Khanna and ofcourse Bunty Soorma who was the co producer of this ill fated venture with the Morani Bros. 'Too many cooks spoil the broth' perfectly applied here and Dushmani turned out to be an unmitigated disaster. Best forgotten!!

Regards, Sumeet Nadkarni.