Shah Rukh Khan is one of the most bankable actors in Bollywood and has impressed the audience with his performances over the years. However, I recently watched one of his movies from the 90s and was left shocked, and puzzled as to why he chose to do such a film with no entertainment quotient, some action, and zero logic. Rakesh Roshan’s next biggie after Karan Arjun, titled Koyla, was quite a headache to watch.
Koyla is one of the rare Shah Rukh Khan films that is not even worth calling a one-time watch. The movie is flawed in every way possible and keeps you wondering constantly as to why you are subjecting yourself to it. The women in the film were cast as props just to show how miserably a man can treat them and how much disrespect and exploitation women face in society. Moreover, I found SRK as a tough guy action hero a misfit. Not only this, but I also felt that Madhuri Dixit, almost 30 by then, didn’t do justice to the role of a teen girl being forcefully married to an old man.
Released in 1997, Koyla revolves around Shankar (Shah Rukh Khan), a servant of Raja Ji (Amrish Puri) who loses his parents and his voice at a young age and how he unfolds the mystery of his parents' death and finds the person who forced burning coal in his mouth because of which he lost his voice. In the first half, SRK has no dialogue. However, even his voice in the second half couldn’t save the movie. He is shown as a faithful servant who keeps count of his master’s wrongdoing but never takes a stand. However, he suddenly falls in love with Madhuri Dixit (Gauri) who is forcefully and deceitfully married to Raja Saab and hence, he must finally go against him.
From derogatory comments about women to calling them ‘piece, property’ is something that irked me. It only got worse with illogical scenes like Raaj Saab cutting Shankar’s throat for running away with his wife but the hero survived. Not only this but a local operation even gives him his voice back. And here I thought that people die after getting their throat slit, but never knew that getting it stitched after so much blood loss can get you a second chance at life.
Johnny Lever and Ashok Saraf did their best to add the much-needed fun element to the movie. However, even their comic timing couldn’t make me like the movie even a bit. The suspense in the movie felt predictable, which made the film even more boring and less bearable. I am sure, if I would have gone to watch the movie in a theatre, I would have walked out happily not even worrying about the money spent on the ticket.
I am quite sure, with the cringe dialogues, illogical storyline, and inappropriate casting, this movie couldn’t be saved even by Shah Rukh Khan’s fandom if released in today’s time and forget about theatres, people would skip it even if it were released on OTT because the content of the movie is too outdated and has almost no entertainment quotient to make it survive.
Read Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan on how Aditya Chopra convinced them to share screen space in Pathaan: 'It always needed...'
