Dutt packs in a power performance

Dutt packs in a power performance

Sanjay Dutt ought to change his name to King Midas. Well, maybe Jungwon't do a golden jubilee, but it stands a fair chance of success, thanks toanother brilliant performance from him and a story that hasn't been toldbefore.

So many films that start with promise fall by the wayside as the plotprogresses. Like Dil Hi Dil Mein, which tripped over the Internetromance theme. Not Jung, though. Jackie Shroff is a police officerwhose child is shown suffering from leukaemia. The seven-year-old needs abone marrow transplant if he is to survive. His problem is compounded by thefact that he has no donor sibling and his blood group is a rareO-Negative.

When, winning a race against time, they find a prospective donor, he turnsout to be psychopath killer Sanjay Dutt, who was Jackie's prize catch.Whether and how Dutt consents to help save the child forms the rest of thegripping narrative. A scene where he commands Jackie to "bow, kneel, cry andbeg" for help is tremendous.

Raveena Tandon is convincing as Jackie's distraught wife, who serves aneviction notice on a Ganpati idol when her son's life is at stake. ShilpaShetty does the job of gangster's moll as well as she can, wearingspacesuits, writing Om on her arm in a cabaret sequence and speaking streetlingo in an English accent.

Others in the cast are Aditya Pancholi, the trigger happy cop at loggerheadswith Jackie, Neeraj Vora as Sanjay Dutt's right hand man, and Saurabh Shuklaas a rival gangster. Navin Nischol makes a welcome appearance as the policechief who is confused about whether he should take up for Jackie or Aditya.Anu Malik, Dev Kohli and Sameer join hands to sink Hindi film music into anabyss from which retrieval seems remote. Aila Re, Dil Mein Jigar Meinand She Gives Me Fever all vie for last place. Only a single-stanzasong, Koi Mane Chahe Na Mane, about the dying child, is the way therest of the numbers should have gone.

Jung was left incomplete by director Sanjay Gupta and the cast whofell out with the producer, but the surprise ending that has been worked outdoes the trick. Only they could have gone easy on the gore scenes in thehospital. The sight of a child coughing blood over and over again does notseem as `filmi' as that of gangsters playing with ketchup.

-- Bella Jaisinghani