Bazooka

The impact of Bryan Singer’s The Usual Suspects is so enormous and timeless that even after three decades, filmmakers are unable to escape its influence on heist thrillers. Bazooka is another attempt at creating an elusive character like Keyser Soze. The catch is that such an attempt requires several things to fall into place, including clever casting that throws the audience off track and creates red herrings. Director Deeno Dennis misses out on this, leading to a predictable twist that’s visible from the get-go. The genius of The Usual Suspects lies in how the characters become real—everyone involved in the heist has something at stake, making their downfall feel impactful. Bazooka, on the other hand, lacks any real conflict. By the end of the film, when the motive behind the gamer villain is revealed, it feels like we’ve been played by the makers.

A few late flourishes can sometimes redeem a film even though it might be hurtling downhill till that point. But, in Deeno Dennis’s directorial debut Bazooka, that supposed redemption arc comes way beyond a point where most of us would have stopped caring for the characters or the plot. It comes almost like a dessert that arrives after a tasteless main course that made your stomach feel queasy. As for the dessert, beyond the dressing on top, it turns out to be the same old under it. In Bazooka, hardly a moment passes without a background score. In a film tailor-made for the superstar’s fans, a good part of this score is dedicated to accentuating his every random movement. It begins right from the moment we see John Caesar (Mammootty) at a bus stop, reading a self-help book and waiting for a bus — inside which a good part of the film takes place. But then, ACP Benjamin Joshua (Gautham Vasudev Menon) also gets the same treatment when we first see him getting out of his car to carry out a routine vehicle check. This is not surprising in a film which survives mostly on its cosmetics.