As the story stunningly completes the circle, sequel seems better than the film’s fuzzy first part!
Ranveer Singh in ‘Dhurandhar: The Revenge’. Pics/Youtube
Dhurandhar: The Revenge
A: Action, thriller
Dir: Aditya Dhar
Actors: Ranveer Singh, Sanjay Dutt
Rating: 3.5/5
Lemme first say what you already know about Dhurandhar: The Revenge — that, in over two decades of reviewing movies in North India, I haven’t come across a film that’s created such cultural urgency to collectively catch a film, like it was Kumbh mela.
I didn’t think as much of the relatively fuzzy Dhurandhar (2025).
Chiefly, because, for all its excruciating length — I was searching for the hero’s journey, while his backstory remained altogether in the backburner, making it hard for me to connect with Hamza (Ranveer Singh), the undercover agent, himself!
Cracker craft apart, one could tell why crowds loved the film. Foremost, for the location, i.e. Pakistan/Karachi, and the well-told story of its ’90s Bombay-like underworld that made Lyari such an explosive landmine for devoted writer-director Aditya Dhar to realistically lay his hands on, and dig deeper.
Sanjay Dutt in ‘Dhurandhar: The Revenge’
In parts, it felt like Satya (1998) with a touch of Company (2002), albeit of the Karachi kind. Many have, since, researched that neighbourhood, online (I’d recommend the Vice series on Lyari on YouTube).
But more so, the audiences got drawn to the ensemble characters — mainly, don Rehman Dakait (Akshaye Khanna), who appeared as the actual ‘hero’ of Dhurandhar. Dead Rehman, of course, is no longer there.
You’ve got to thank Dhar still for giving us back the great comedian, Rakesh Bedi, in his own, new, stellar form as the semi-serious, leery Jameel Jamali!
The sequel, however, wholly belongs to Dhurandhar, as in Ranveer — staggeringly transforming from a lean, vulnerable, crew-cut Jaskirat to the wild, nutso, long-haired Hamza.
You learn everything you ought to know to finally anchor your emotions on the protagonist; following, appreciating his every move, over 229.06 minutes, straight.
It’s almost as if Dhar first made Ranveer (Jayeshbhai Jordaar, Cirkus) a proper ‘star’ — with box-office collections of the prequel — and then treated him as one, in the second part!
The young Jaskirat story starts with him vanquishing a criminal family, back in Indian Punjab. There’s a property dispute. Land is a bone of contention in another sub-plot of Dhurandhar 2. This concerns Rehman Dakait and Bade Saab. Which is how the latter lost his brother, Noor, in Karachi.
It's a widely reported anecdote. Bade Saab = Dawood Ibrahim — possibly the most serially fictionalised real-life character on Indian screen.
Most recently, ‘Dawood’ appeared as a matador in Spain in Vishal Bhardwaj’s O’Romeo (2026), while the same actor (Avinash Tiwary) played him in Bombay’s streets on the show, Bambai Meri Jaan (2023)!
Dawood, likely in his late 60s, appears as a wrecked, ailing baldie in Dhurandhar; seems closer to the truth.
As do other publicly known figures around him from, say, Nawaz Sharief, referring to “Mr 10 per cent” Zardari, down to People’s Aman Committee in Pakistan (pronounced ‘Paak-stan’).
It’s these straight-off connections playing on your mind, so seamlessly blurring fantasy and non-fiction, that lends immeasurable heft to Indian secret service agent Hamza’s work-life as he takes the Pak deep-state by its horns.
Yet, make no mistake. This movie is make-believe. As all hardcore actioners tend to be; inevitably widening lens, upping scale. The more intimate action here is in, unequal parts, frantically pornographic, and unhingedly grotesque.
There’s a certain rhythm to it, though, that you get used to, eventually — as super-composer, Shashwat Sachdev, pumps up volume, kills it with the beats, where you can even spot riffs from Michael Jackson! That’s the Dhurandhar template.
I’m sure you’ll have a favourite set-piece. Mine’s the mortal-combat sequence inside a loo, where the dude getting walloped has a syringe-needle pierce through the apple of his eye, his head smashed against the bathtub! Pouf.
The other question popping in people’s heads, as it popularly did during Dhurandhar is, if this is a pure propaganda picture. Frankly, with movies, I don’t consider propaganda a pejorative/insult, per se; unless downright offensive like, say, The Kerala Story.
What’s James Bond, if not propaganda — overestimating might of the British Empire, through a spy-thriller. That said, there’s enough in this film, 2016 demonetisation onwards, that’ll warm the cockles of the current establishment’s heart.
And still, if anything, it seems there’s more influence attributed to ISI on India — state elections, “NGO, media, socialists, universities…” — than even they may take credit for! As for sheer hate, Jaskirat/Hamza tells his wife, he has no problem with Pakistanis, only the extremists within.
The main villain is the lethal Arjun Rampal, namely, ISI’s Major Iqbal. Ample footage focusses on raising his stature to stand as tall as the hero. Which also explains four hours of this film, besides extensive violence for violence’s sake.
Yup, it’s four frickin’ hours! I didn’t quite feel it. But for certain passages. Such is the stunning quality of storytelling, immensely packed with material, that completes the circle from the first part that had left me bereft. Which often happens with movies where the end is merely the interval for the sequel.
Hence, say, Baahubali, Gangs of Wasseypur 2 > 1. And The Revenge way better than Dhurandhar!
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