Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Rustom - Movie Review

Akshay Kumar got some nice reviews for this movie. It was a sensational case - Commander Nanavathy, a decorated naval officer, shot to death his wife's lover in upmarket Bombay in 1959. The case was famous and I remember hearing of it as a kid. Apparently one of the last cases where we had a jury system of a trial and the jury voted 8-1 Not Guilty.

Akshay Kumar plays Commander Rustom Pavri who comes home early from a voyage and finds out that his wife is having an affair with one of his friends. He goes back to the ship, gets a revolver, bullets, goes to his friend's house, and three shots are fired. The friend is dead, towel around his waist, fresh from his bath. His servant comes up and sees the commander with a gun in his hand. Commander Pavri surrenders to the police, chooses to stay in police custody and not naval custody. There is a hint of some papers etc and we know then that there is more to this than the murder. Turns out that the naval boss was involved with this friend and they conspired to get some sub standard equipment that Pavri does not approve of. Pavri's good intent goes waste as most people in the hierarchy seem to be corrupt. Pavri somehow gets a lot of public sympathy - in the real life incident protest were staged seeking his acquittal as the wronged husband - and gets away from the jury.

However the High Court sentences him to jail and in real life he got an early pardon from the Governor Vijay Laxmi Pandit (he was close to the Nehru's) and relocated to Canada with his wife and children where he lived till 2003.

I liked the Bombay they recreated, the colours. Esha Gupta was nice.

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