Ikka

Ikka refuses to be a simple good versus evil drama. Two men- a star lawyer, Arjun Mehra, and Shauryaman Gaur, a spoilt kid of an influential politician- who are at loggerheads with each other personally and professionally, are forced to come together for an attempted murder case. An underdog lawyer, Madhura Banerjee, serves as the public prosecutor. Sunny Deol and Tillotama Shome deliver credible performances among the leads. The former genuinely surprises you with his restraint in the need of the hour and enjoys going ballistic occasionally. He appears composed and unperturbed within the courtroom and transforms effortlessly into a man consumed by guilt back home. Tillotama is as assured as ever with a confident portrayal of a rookie lawyer.

Sunny Deol and Tilottama Shome playing opposing lawyers in a very commercial thriller is a promising premise for an engaging watch. In Siddharth P Malhotra’s Ikka, Deol plays a hot-shot successful lawyer Arjun Mehra defending a murder accussed Shauryaman Gaur, played by Akshaye Khanna, while Shome plays the prosecutor of the case. The two come from very different schools of cinema, and thus, seeing them share screen space in a film holds a lot of promise. But does Ikka, a Netflix film, deliver? Let’s find out.

‘इक्का’ समझते हैं न आप? ताश के खेल में सबसे अव्वल माना जाता है इसे। वकील अर्जुन मेहरा को लोग इक्का कहते हैं क्योंकि वह आज तक कोई केस नहीं हारा। और यह तब है जब वह हमेशा मासूमों के पक्ष में हक के लिए लड़ता है। लेकिन इस बार मामला अलग है। उद्योगपति नेता का बिगड़ैल बेटा शौर्यमन एक लड़की के मर्डर के मामले में फंसा है। अर्जुन को किसी मजबूरी के चलते यह केस लेना पड़ता है। आखिर क्या थी उसकी मजबूरी? और क्या अर्जुन इस बार गलत आदमी का साथ दे रहा है? क्या वह यह केस हारेगा या जीत कर इक्का बना रहेगा? देखने-सुनने में यह फिल्म (Ikka) एक थ्रिलरनुमा कोर्टरूम ड्रामा लग रही है। ऐसी फिल्मों में कहानी बताई नहीं, छुपाई जाती है। इसका ट्रेलर भी कुछ खास परतें नहीं खोल रहा है। खासतौर से अर्जुन की उस मजबूरी का ज़िक्र कहीं नहीं है जिसके चलते वह शौर्यमन गौड़ का केस लेता है। (फिल्म में सरनेम ‘गौर’ व ‘गौड़’ बोला गया है। भई ऐसा सरनेम रखते ही क्यों हो जिसे रोमन में पढ़ कर एक्टर ठीक से बोल ही न पाएं?) इस फिल्म को देखते समय लगता है कि स्क्रीन पर सब ठीक-ठाक चल रहा है। लेकिन बहुत जल्दी इस ठीक-ठाक के नीचे दबी कहानी का पिलपिलापन महसूस होने लगता है। फिल्म खत्म होते-होते काफी कुछ अधूरा-सा, बनावटी-सा, जबरन-सा महसूस होने लगता है। जब आप खुद से सवाल पूछते हैं कि यह जो देखा, इसमें गहराई कितनी थी तो अंदर से कोई ढंग का जवाब नहीं आता।

It’s a clash between two of the great cinematic faces on the movies this week. In Netflix’s latest original film, Ikka, Sunny Deol goes up against Akshaye Khanna (sort of). Who called it Ikka and not ‘Face-Off’? The courtroom thriller brings Deol back to his Damini days, with a courtroom serving as an arena for him to scream justice at us and fight for the little guy. Director Siddharth P Malhotra’s (Hichki, We Are Family, Maharaj) film is loud, unsubtle, and armed with an emotion-splaining background score determined to do all the feeling for us and leave little to the imagination (or heart).

A personal crisis forces Arjun Mehra (Sunny Deol), a celebrated lawyer, to set aside his personal beliefs and defend murder suspect Shauryamann Gaur (Akshaye Khanna), an entitled brat he deeply despises. Does morality have a place in legal practice? Must a defence lawyer believe in a client’s innocence to defend them? Probably not. Director Siddharth P. Malhotra attempts to subvert that notion, which is interesting. His protagonist, Arjun Mehra (Sunny Deol), is an idealist who firmly believes that the world roots for heroes, not villains. His moral convictions are put to the test when he’s compelled to defend the deeply unlikeable Shauryamann Gaur (Akshaye Khanna), accused of attempting to murder Soma Mittal (Akansha Ranjan Kapoor), a young woman he is last seen leaving a nightclub with. While Gaur insists he’s innocent, the prosecution, led by lawyer Madhura Bannerjee (Tillotama Shome), appears to have enough evidence to prove otherwise.

Nothing good happens to Akshaye Khanna in an SUV. In Dhurandhar (2025), he narrowly escapes an assassination attempt inside the car and now, in Siddharth P Malhotra’s courtroom-drama Ikka, a girl’s bloodied body falls off his vehicle’s shotgun seat in the dead of the night. Akshaye’s Shauryaman Gaur is the perfect villain. He is a politician’s brat whose smugness alone seems to be substantial evidence for the crime. But did he actually do it? Or was it just a slip that metastasized into a sin?