The Accidental Prime Minister movie review: Anupam Kher is impressive, but the film loses out in execution

Based on Sanjaya Baru’s book, The Accidental Prime Minister, the film is about our former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh and his journey as the PM for a decade. The film shows how he had to fill in the position because the real candidates were afraid for their lives. It also talks about his struggles to cope up with the challenges he was facing while in office. The Accidental Prime Minister is that two hours long satya ghatna par adharit video that you watch to know what the story is, but don’t get into the quality of the product considering the aspects of cinema. (But then I have to consider them, if I don’t then why am I even reviewing it).

First of all it takes courage to put out a story that is not actually in anyone’s favour (though alleged to be an agenda film, it’s still difficult to call out the leaders, whichever political party they may belong to). The story is told by Sanjaya played by Akshaye Khanna who randomly looks into the camera in between the scenes and explains the story which seems a bit comical sometimes, even when it isn’t supposed to. Akshaye doesn’t look like Sanjaya Baru at all, but okay, I will still buy that.

Going into the technical details, the film fails, bad CGI, badly photoshopped images where you can figure out how randomly Kher’s face is photoshopped on Dr Manmohan Singh’s body. I understand the director was trying to make a docu-drama but I don’t expect the audience breaking into laughter in such a serious concept film. Also the background music for a major portion of runtime sounds like straight out of a Barbie fantasy film and that palace like office seems to be Rapunzel ‘s bedroom.

Now comes the acting part, remember initially when I said Satya ghatna par adharit? Let’s understand, there is a big difference between copying someone’s personality (mimic) and acting that person. Every character except Kher, in the film is somewhere in between those two, which isn’t a good space to be actually. Anupam Kher has worked on himself to get everything right and he looks the part. As I said, sometimes you want to know the story and that is told clearly. It doesn’t try to brainwash you, it is just the writer Sanjaya Baru and director Vijay Gutte’s take on the topic.

Credit where it’s due, a scene where we see Kher as Dr Manmohan Singh walking into the Prime Minister’s Office on the first day of his service, he recalls all his years of being into the government service and that gives you an insight of the kind of experience this man has and doesn’t show off. If you are someone who follows politics, watch and you must to get a new and fresh perspective that this film has tried to showcase. But don’t go in expecting entertainment, because that isn’t the genre.

PS: I don’t know if it was meant to, but everyone in the hall started laughing when there was a cameo by a caricature of Arnab Goswami.

PPS: I got to know what Que Sera Sera means today, go watch and find out.