We received the censor certificate of Son Of Sardar on Friday evening. The runtime of the Ajay Devgn starrer is exactly 140.41 minutes (2 hours 20 mins).
SOS is shorter than an average Bollywood film (150 mins), which will prove to be beneficial at the box office in it’s opening weekend. Even though the other release next week, Jab Tak Hai Jaan, is likely to get more screens, exhibitors can squeeze in more shows of Son Of Sardar.
In comparison, the runtime of Son Of Sardar is exactly 37 minutes shorter than Jab Tak Hai Jaan (2 hours 57 mins).
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Ajay Devgn’s Diwali gamble didn’t quite pay off this time. A film like ‘Son of Sardar’ can work on two accounts, either on the merit of star power or on the quantity/quality of amusing gimmicks that the makers can pack in. However, with a flimsy plot and inadequate humour, the story fails to take off.
Simply put, it is a bloody revenge saga where Jassi (Ajay Devgn) and Billu (Sanjay Dutt) belong to the opposite camps. Jassi comes to India to sell off an ancestral property and wants nothing to do with the existing family hostility but the Sandhus are still waiting to settle the score. Predictably he falls in love with Sukh (Sonakshi), the girl from the enemy camp and he must now, not only fight for his life but also his love.
Jassi discovers that the only way to save himself is to remain a guest in the Sandhu household and thus, follows tedious hide-and-seek sequences where the Sardar tries to pull off one daft trick after the other to avoid the talwar. The action sequences and the gags don’t pack in enough punch to lift the sagging narrative.
Sanjay Dutt’s angry/soft flip-flop and his incomplete love story with Pammi (Juhi Chawla) make for the few moments of genuine laughter. Rest of the humour and the funny one-liners are either oft repeated or annoyingly slapstick.