Publish on: 6 Apr 2015-The 'invisible man' concept has been done in Bollywood quite a few times before. Films like Vijay Bhatt's MR. X, Kishore Kumar starrer MR. X IN BOMBAY, Tusshar Kapoor starrer GAAYAB and the Shekhar Kapoor directed cult film MR. INDIA have been some of the films done in the past. This week's release is Vikram Bhatt's MR. X, a film that's again based on the 'invisible man'. Will this film make its 'presence felt' at the box-office or will it do the disappearing act, let's analyze. The film starts off with Anti Terrorist Department's (ATD) Inspector Raghu (Emraan Hashmi) in action along with his colleague cum fiancée Siya Varma (Amyra Dastur), saving a bus full of passengers that's about to be blasted by a human bomb. Post the incident, when Raghu and Siya are about to get married, Raghu is sent on a mission of the Chief Minister's safety by his superior Bharadwaj (Arunodaya Singh). The situation takes a U-turn when Raghu gets to know that he is basically being used as a pawn in order to kill the minister. And when Raghu refuses to be a part of this plan, he gets threatened with Siya's life. Left with no option, Raghu lands up shooting the minister in front of the full media. When he manages to escape, he gets caught by Bharadwaj and his men, who beat him mercilessly and leave him to die. Suddenly, a 'divine intervention' takes place and Raghu springs back to life but in a very distorted state. That's when his friend Popo (Tanmay Bhatt) takes him to his scientist sister, who treats him with an 'experimental potion'. Even though the potion cures his disfigured body, it lands up making him invisible. He can be seen only in sunlight and ultra violet light. Taking advantage of his invisibility, Raghu starts operating under the name of 'Mr. X' and initiates the revenge drama wherein he vows to eliminate the corrupt bad guys. The story then takes another twist when Siya starts hating Raghu to the core because of him killing the minister. She, unknowingly, joins Bharadwaj and teams up against Raghu in order to arrest him. Does the innocent Siya become successful in helping the villainous Bharadwaj in arresting Raghu, does Siya ever get to know the truth that the mysterious Mr. X is no one else Raghu, will the invisible Raghu be becomes successful in avenging his 'killers', is what which forms the rest of the story. Besides the fact that the film's director Vikram Bhatt attempts his hand in the 'invisible man' genre, there is absolutely nothing about the film that's worth its salt. Given that it's an 'Emraan Hashmi' film, Vikram should have ensured that he gives the audiences the quintessential 'Emraan Hashmi-ims', which are sorely missing in the film. Even though one cannot question Vikram's sincerity in attempting a film of a genre that's majorly based on vfx, the 3D effects are not bad. With such a promising concept, expectations of having a gripping storyline and captivating screenplay meets with zero results. What is shocking is that, Vikram, who has earlier made quality 3D films like CREATURE, is hampered in MR. X because of the lack of a convincing screenplay. Even though the film looks engaging at places, the treatment given to the film doesn't live upto the audiences' expectations. This is solely because of the shaky plot which fails to hold the viewers' interest for long. While the first half of the film takes its own time to establish, the second half tends to drag endlessly (esp. the climax). While a typical 'Emraan Hashmi' film is always laced with memorable one liners, MR. X's dialogues (Shagufta Rafique) are corny. As far as the performances in the film is concerned, even though the film depends heavily on the otherwise effortless Emraan Hashmi, he seems to be struggling in this film. For some strange reason, his performance comes across as a very restrained one. His love-hate relationship with Amyra's character leaves the audiences confused at regular intervals. The irony of the situation is that, even though the film is titled as MR. X, the film and Emraan both seem to be lacking the 'X' factor in unison. Emraan's on screen chemistry with Amyra seems to be lacking the required 'spark' to ignite the film. Speaking about Amyra, this is her second film after ISSAK. Despite the fact that she doesn't ooze the raw and rustic sensuality that is expected of a 'Bhatt heroine', she comes across as simple but stunningly beautiful in the film. It's her character's flip-flop which however endlessly drags the film in its second half. Despite being a towering personality, Arunoday Singh, sadly, seems to be wasted in the film.

• published: 21 Jun 2015
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