nitin jain

There is something particularly disappointing about Haiwaan because the film arrives with the kind of combination that makes you want to believe in it even before you watch it. Akshay Kumar, Saif Ali Khan and Priyadarshan together again. On paper, that is the sort of reunion that should make a film enthusiast curious. And then there is the title itself. Haiwaan. It is a word that does a lot of work before the film has even begun.

There was plenty riding on Haiwaan. Akshay Kumar and Saif Ali Khan return together after 17 years, with Akshay playing a ruthless psychopath (Parshuram Gokhale) and Saif a visually impaired martial artist (Shyam Rane). Then there is Priyadarshan, returning to the thriller space with a Hindi remake of his own 2016 Malayalam film Oppam. On paper, the combination is hard to ignore.

There is a familiar cycle in Hindi cinema. A film works. Its box office numbers become the reference point. Soon, similar stories begin appearing in development, similar pitches start making the rounds and an individual film’s success quietly turns into an industry template. Kareena Kapoor Khan believes that is precisely the problem.