Movie Review: Baby

Vidit Bhargava
Director: Neeraj Pandey. 
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Rasheed Naz, Danny Denzongpa, Anupam Kher and Kay Kay Menon.

Here’s what a Neeraj Pandey movie generally is, it’s a decent story with an extraordinary climax and brilliant performances by all actors, which is what makes it a memorable experience. Baby, however is no crowning jewel for the director. 

A terrorist escapes prison, a supposed Dead Agent shows up in Nepal and a trusted recruit turns Rogue, putting the Baby team, a special cell of the ATU, hot on the trail of a major terror attack plot against the country. Complete with Thrilling chase sequences, Guns, Gadgets and espionage, it has all the makings of a decent thriller. 

Coming from the director of ‘A Wednesday’ and ‘Special 26’ both of them known for their originality of ideas and out of the box treatment, this movie’s disappointing in a lot of areas. Baby’s neither got wildly original ideas nor does the thriller genre get a special treatment. Borrowing ideas from Argo and Zero Dark Thirty, it’s a conventional spy-thriller which relies more on thrills and impressive fight sequences rather than content.

In a slow and jerky first half, joggling between frequent lapses in logic and jingoistic dialogues, Baby’s hardly passable. In one of the early sequences, The escape of a terrorist in broad daylight on a busy Mumbai road is just one of the many logic-less sequences from the movie.The second half however, catches a bit of pace, providing better thrills and with a much more gripping screenplay and even though the climax isn’t entirely original, it’s extremely gripping.

Rana Daggubatti deserved a lot more screen space, He can definitely act! 

Baby’s strength however lies in crisp conversations with clap inducing dialogues and some good comic timing in particularly tense situations. That, along with good performances from every one makes Baby an enjoyable experience. Amongst the actors, Rasheed Naz looks in good touch in his role of the Terror Master Mind, Anupam Kher and Rana Dugabatti, although in short cameos are extremely impressive. But credit to Tapsee Panu who plays her cameo with surprising aplomb.

Going to watch Baby, I was expecting a different take on conventional thrillers. I was disappointed. What I got instead, was an enjoyable and brisk action thriller, but hardly something memorable. Despite it’s many flaws, Baby is still worth a watch but don’t expect too much from it.

That's how they shot down logic!

Rating: 7/10 It’s good but not Neeraj Pandey Good