Alpha movie review: Alia Bhatt, Sharvari's film is a flat, tedious addition to the spy universe

First things first. Alia Bhatt is no Lara Croft and YRF is no Marvel. The studio’s latest release, Alpha, projects Alia Bhatt as a deadly assassin, treated like a lab rat since her birth, who goes rogue and turns against her mentor, played by Bobby Deol. On paper, the film may have felt like a brilliant idea. After all, YRF pitches two heroines as the lead, flexing muscles, killing bad guys without any male superstar. However, the film's execution is shoddy and stereotypical, making Alpha a slow-paced, cleaner reverse of Dhurandhar. Confused? Let me explain

Plot of Alpha

Alia Bhatt is estranged from her biological father, Colonel Luthra (Anil Kapoor) right at her birth. Kidnapped by Lt Colonel Fateh Singh Shekhawat (Bobby Deol), Sita grows up in a run-down oil refinery where she is weekly tested for Shekhawat’s secret mission called Project Alpha. Alpha was a life-changing serum developed to help soldiers heal quickly. The secret mission was carried out under Luthra’s leadership soon after the Kargil war to create a special task force. Sita, being the only human on whom the serum had worked, is trained by Shekhawat to be a deadly assassin, but at the cost of being completely isolated from her family, unaware of her father and a twin sister, Durga (Sharvari).

20 years later, Sita turns rogue and decides to eliminate the man whom she fondly called Baba all her life. On the way, she reconnects with family, sister and dad, who is now the R&AW chief, and together they have to eliminate Shekhawat and his army of masked men. Shekhawat is not who he seems to be. Let's just say he is Ranveer Singh from Dhurandhar, but reverse. Get it?

What works and what does not

Helmed by Shiv Rawail and written by Soumil Shukla and Shridhar Raghavan, ALpha sets out to be a story of personal vendetta but somewhere along the way becomes a spy thriller. It is a known fact that Alia Bhatt has great screen presence and is a good actor. Give her any role, and she delivers. In Alpha, we see her in a very different avatar, that of a cold-blooded assassin who kills before talking. While she kicks and punches with utmost conviction, Alia still feels out of place in most of the action sequences. Call it conditioning of one’s mind, but somehow a petite Alia does not really fit the bill of a deadly spy who takes on men double her size with complete nonchalance.

There is Sharvari, who is introduced in a completely unncesary song sequence which looks like a long advertorial of Puma or Nike or a similar brand. Sharvari , who impressed one and all with her performance in Main Vaapas Aaunga a few weeks back, plays the chirpy counterpart of Sita in Alpha. The scenes of the two women, exploring the wilderness of what we are told is Kashmir, while on the run, are nice even though limited. Wish they had shown the two actresses learning and discovering more about each other, reconnecting after being separated at birth. But writers spent too much time establishing how deadly Shekhawat is and a very convoluted Project Alpha and thus skipped the good parts.

When you have good actors on board, the makers waste them in mind-numbing action sequences and random skin show. At one point, the two sisters jump off a cliff but first strip to funky swimwear and then dive in. On the run, with limited means and food, the girls somehow manage to keep changing their outfits throughout- all very stylish tank tops and cargos. But logic and continuity are not Alpha’s strong points.

Hrithik Roshan pops up in between, doing a mandala in a monastery quietly. While the sequence is well choreographed, it is completely forced.

By the time the interval happens, the film has nose-dived into an illogical mess. At some point, Sharvari is shot and is recuperating in Leh. In the next scene, she is leading a group of Indian commandos in Cherapunji to eliminate Shekhawat and his boys. The climax is just a lot of action sequence which make no sense. What begins as Sita’s journey slowly becomes a story of saving India and India’s honour. The country is even described as the ‘best boss’ in the world!

Anil Kapoor and Bobby Deol are there to flex their muscles. Both play father figures to Alia, but their roles are so badly written that you don't feel any emotion for them- not even for the villain. Deol mostly speaks slowly, in a low baritone, which only makes one sleepy.

Final verdict

I am all for an all-women team of spies, killing, hitting and eliminating bad men. It is a different high to witness a film that has women taking charge and doing the heavy lifting. But Alpha messes up from the word go. Its execution is poor, its plot is wafer-thin. It bores you more than it thrills you. Alpha tries to use the same template that it had for the Tiger series and Pathaan, making the film feel jaded. It's an utter mess.

Two years back, audiences world over had felt superhero fatigue thanks to the multiple films and series that were being churned out by Marvel and DC. I am now suffering from Spy thriller fatigue. These high-octane action thrillers are all looking the same. YRF should give its spies some rest.

Alpha is out in cinemas worldwide.