Shabaash Mithu Review: The movie that all cricket fans have been waiting for desperately has finally been released. And it is sad that Shabaash Mithu will go down as one of Bollywood’s most significant missed opportunities.
Mithali Raj’s story is something that legends are made out of. And yet this movie does so little to tell us anything about that. A girl who went from the small streets of Jodhpur to represent India in the World Cup 6 times.
Her illustrious career includes 232 ODIs, 89 T20I matches, and six World Cups. And that is not an ordinary feat that anyone can achieve. Yet, this movie was ordinary, making us question everything we know about cricket.
We have seen Bollywood making good biopics showing the ups and downs of the person. At the same time, we have also seen one-dimensional biopics where the protagonist can do no wrong. Sadly, Shabaash Mithu falls in the latter category.
Shabaash Mithu Review: Plot Analysis
The movie is a biopic around Mithali Raj, the longest-serving captain of the Indian Women Cricket National Team. Shabaash Mithu shows the life of Mithali Raj from a young age to her rise to the biggest stage in World Cricket.
The movie shows us her childhood, her love for cricket, the obstacles she faced, and how she overcame the obstacles and reached her dreams. To be honest, the creators had a perfect story in front of them.
They had to do nothing and present us with the movie in a simple form. They had the perfect story, yet they made a mess out of everything. The laggy screenplay and one-dimensional characters made a story with so much potential a dud.
Shabaash Mithu Review: Positives
Cast
There were very few positive points in the movie. And the cast was the most significant positive point of this movie. All the cast members understood their assignments and did their best with what they were given.
Taapsee Pannu put so much effort into making this role her own. Keeping the production problems aside, she did way better than I expected her to do. Vijay Raaz was excellent as usual; we already know he will ace the role.
But the real highlight for me was Kasturi Jagnam as Mithali’s childhood friend Noori and Inayat Varma’s performance as young Mithali, and surely Taapsee Pannu. They stole the show.
Flashback Scenes
All the childhood scenes were fantastic, and everything was alright till there. The bias of boys while including girls to play with them. Their urge to show their superiority and then Mithali shutting them all up was a good sight.
Shabaash Mithu Review: Negatives
One-Dimensional
We have seen biopics like these before. Biopic like PM Narendra Modi was a prime example of that. Shabaahs Mithu shines Mithali Raj in a single light. She is the messiah of the Indian Women Cricket Team while the whole world is against her.
And that is not how you should make a biopic. It not only made the point that Mithali Raj was all supreme and correct all the time but also that everyone around her was a sort of villain in her life and held her down.
Screenplay
The screenplay of the movie was the real villain. They ruin the movie with a lackluster screenplay that did not do any favor to any characters. None of the achievements of Mithali Raj felt special in any kind, which is a shame.
We were cut to a different scene before we could digest what a feat Mithali Raj has achieved. There was nothing unique in any scene distinguishing it from the previous one. It was like you were watching an extended montage.
Make-Up
They dropped the ball when it came to makeup. Even Tapsee Pannu did not look like Mithali Raj in any way. All the other characters suffered from the same fate. It was the performances of the cast that saved the production team.
But it is also a fact that the make-up completely dulled artists’ performances massively. And that is a shame.
Research
With all the flaws, Shabaash Mithu does not even cover all the essential facts of Mithali’s career. All her achievements were covered in just 2 campaigns, and that was it. All her achievements were covered in such a small time.
Even the 2017 world cup looked like a massive rush job. Srijit Sarkar stated in an interview that the pandemic had ruined most of their plans, but with this budget, it was evident that they did not do any research.
Shabaash Mithu Review: Is It Worth It?
Shabaash Mithu Review: As a general viewer, No!! But if you are a cricket fan like me, we owe it to Mithali Raj to watch this movie. But this movie does not do any justice to her. It is merely surface-level cinema.
It was like they searched Wikipedia and made the movie out of that. And with all the fantastic biopics we have at our disposal, you can skip this one or wait until it comes out on the OTT platform.
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