'Crakk' review: Headache-inducing, excruciating long film gets almost everything wrong
Aditya Datt's Crakk (made my head explode, so it justifies that title) stars actors with chiseled, shredded bodies (Vidyut Jammwal, Arjun Rampal) and is shot in multiple picturesque locations. Those are the only factors in its favor because everything else is in shambles. With no narrative profundity or semblance of any cohesion, it competes with Ganapath in which one can cause more intense headaches.
Sorry excuse for a story
Not that it matters, but Crakk is about Siddhu (Jammwal), a Mumbaikar who wants to compete in a deadly, extreme task-based game called Maidaan, run by Dev (Rampal). Dev, an evil reincarnate, receives sadistic pleasure when people die violent deaths during these games and for some reason, is also working toward a nuclear bomb to make his separate country. Yes, really.
Too many inspirations but insufferable execution
Crakk is everything all at once; a confused, mish-mash of projects. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire meets Khatron Ke Khiladi meets Squid Game meets The Hunger Games, Crakk is heavily inspired by all these titles but sorely lacks their bite and their narrative depth. Siddhu's brother dies playing the same games, but since there's no emotional heft, we couldn't care less.
'Tapori' Mumbai language does it no good
How would the audience remember that Siddhu belongs to Mumbai? Firstly, he mentions this every 15 minutes, and secondly, he speaks in that trademark tapori language apparently specific to the region. In the beginning, I may have gotten second-hand embarrassment from hearing him speak some of those jarring dialogues, and I couldn't help but wonder, "Can he please speak normally for once?"
It's satisfied with being below-average
Another problem with Crakk is that it doesn't, even once, try to become better. It never stops to catch a breath and clearly doesn't believe in slowing down, so there's always something keeping the screen occupied (for example mindless, unnecessary songs). Resultantly, it suffers and stutters because it doesn't know when to go all out and when to calm a bit down.
Another film with Jammwal's potential wasted
One has to feel for Jammwal, whose talent seems to be getting squandered left, right, and center in projects like these where he repeatedly plays run-of-the-mill, painfully forgettable characters. Here, too, Crakk could have been some sort of a decent watch if it weren't so preoccupied with being overly lengthy and had instead heightened its stakes by being taut, intense, and fast-paced.
Predictable, with hardly any thrills despite its premise
Each time the story started building up a little, there came a painful, outrageous onslaught of action scenes. This is a pattern—a code of conduct, rather—that Crakk lives by. Because the film is over two hours long, you can guess the exact moment it will go up in flames since it burns so much precious time doing the same things over and over again.
The representation of female actors
No points for guessing that Nora Fatehi and Amy Jackson come and go, and the makers keep forgetting that their tracks exist too (more so in the former's case). Fatehi plays Alia, an influencer (what else did you think?), and falls for Siddhu in one of the most cringe-worthy romances I've seen onscreen. Jackson, thankfully, gets a relatively meatier part as Patricia, a cop.
Great action, but is that enough?
There is a lot of slick and suave action on display and one can't help but admire it (especially a bicycle chase sequence closer to the climax). Neatly choreographed hand-to-hand combat action scenes are also worth mentioning but they cannot fill the gaping holes left by the lack of a well-stretched-out plot. It marches to its own tune, but sadly, there's no rhythm.
We wached it so you won't have to
At no point can Crakk hear itself, even though we feel the palpable cringe from across the screen. It features three deadly races that contestants compete in, and it's not just them who are being tested. We're also in a race here; can we sit through the entire two-hour-and-36-minute length of Crakk? Alas, there's no prize for surviving till the end. 1.5/5 stars.
