Director: Pulkit Cast: Rajkummar Rao Prosenjit Chatterjee Manushi Chillar and others. Stars: 1.5Story Set in 1990s in Allahabad (now Prayagraj), Maalik portrays a fight, not between the good and the wicked but between two gangsters. While Deepak (Rajkummar Rao) is one gangster, his rival is Chandrashekar (played by Saurabh Sachdeva). They compete to secure government contacts and sand mining rights. A corrupt politician Balhar Singh (Swanand Kirkire), his henchman Shankar Singh (Saurabh Shukla), a cop Prabhudas (Prosenjit) portray other key roles in the movie replete with illogical violence. The movie is filled with gore as Deepak, along with his friend Baudan Singh (Anushman Pushkar), is shown to be involved in non-stop killing, ignoring the pleas of his parents and wife (Manushi Chillar), to mend his ways. Direction Written/directed by Pulkit (Bhakshak), Maalik is a worn-out idea showcasing excessive violence and crime. The director has failed to show anything new nor did he attempt to break new grounds, all seen and done in earlier films. The storyline is monotonously boring and very predictable. Cast and credits performance Rajkummar Rao portrays the character of an Allahabad University student-turned-gangster in the late 80s. He plays an underdog, who is immorally greedy to acquire the status of top dog by hook or crook, by knocking down anyone and everyone who hinders his way. Rajkummar emotes well but his arrogance looks copied from earlier action stars and villains, shattering the hopes of his fans. He fails to impress in the run-of-the-mill kind of role. Manushi Chillar, who plays Maalik’s wife, tries to see that Rajkummar sticks to ethics but fails to do justice to her character. She needs to improve her craft to be able to survive in this cut-throat industry. The rest of the cast and credits are passable. A film with inexorable violence cannot never be entertaining. It is just unpleasant, totally boring and without an iota of doubt fails to engage the audience. A predictable film, Maalik can’t be a breakthrough action film for Rajkummar. Better luck next time.
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