Jung (2000)
Starring: Raveena Tandon, Jackie Shroff, Sanjay Dutt, Shilpa Shetty, Aditya Pancholi
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Synopsis: Fairly desperate desi-fication of a pretty dire Desperate Measures
Reviewed by: Faiz Khan

 

I approached Jung with considerable hesitation. After all, it was another Sanjay Gupta "original" which, strangely enough, bore more than a passing resemblance to Desperate Measures. Then there was the cast: a perpetually tearful Raveena Tandon, a glamorous Shilpa Shetty, a perpetually glum Jackie Shroff and Sanjay Dutt once again playing the fearsome villain who, deep down, turns out to be rather decent after all.

What exactly was there to look forward to?

Well...surprisingly, it wasn't quite the disaster I had expected.

Perhaps that was inevitable. When expectations have sunk to rock bottom, almost anything vaguely competent begins to look respectable. Mind you, Jung isn't exactly a good film either. That would be praise it simply doesn't deserve. What it does attempt is to provide a slick, fast-moving thriller, and for a while it succeeds before eventually collapsing under the weight of its own excesses.

The story begins with a young boy being diagnosed with leukaemia.

Naturally, this is immediately followed by a sentimental song featuring the child.

His father, a police officer played by Jackie Shroff, is informed that only one suitable bone marrow donor can save the boy's life. Unfortunately, the donor happens to be the notorious gangster Balli (Sanjay Dutt), who is safely locked away in prison.

To make matters even worse, it was Jackie who put him there in the first place.

Unable to accept the idea of his son receiving bone marrow from a hardened criminal, Jackie initially refuses. His wife eventually persuades him otherwise, and he reluctantly approaches Balli with the desperate request.

Balli refuses.

Then he realises that agreeing to the operation might provide him with the perfect opportunity to escape.

Naturally...

...he does.

The film then develops into an entertaining race against time. Jackie must capture Balli alive before another trigger-happy police officer, played by Aditya Pancholi, shoots him on sight. Pancholi's cop is so unhinged that he actually comes across as considerably more dangerous than Balli himself.

Balli, meanwhile, seeks refuge with his loyal moll, played by Shilpa Shetty, who naturally turns out to be a gangster's girlfriend with a heart of gold.

Up to this point, Jung moves at an impressive pace and generates a reasonable amount of excitement.

Unfortunately, the screenplay then loses its nerve.

Instead of concentrating on the central conflict, the film suddenly wanders off into an entirely different revenge story after Balli is double-crossed by one of his associates. It feels less like a natural development than an obvious attempt to stretch a ninety-minute thriller into a three-hour Hindi film.

Things grind to a complete halt when three songs arrive in rapid succession, bringing the momentum crashing to earth.

Sanjay Dutt famously advised his fans not to watch the film, claiming that a dispute between the producer and director had left it unfinished and that parts of his dubbing remained incomplete.

Frankly, I couldn't tell.

The film looked complete enough to me.

Dutt himself is perfectly watchable, although his character never really settles into a convincing rhythm. We are repeatedly told what a terrifying criminal Balli is, yet much of his screen time is spent exchanging banter with his comic sidekick, played by Neeraj Vora, making him seem surprisingly harmless.

Jackie Shroff has disappointingly little to do and never really makes much of an impression. Raveena fares slightly better, while Shilpa Shetty is perhaps the film's biggest beneficiary. Looking more glamorous than ever, she handles her role confidently, and Jung should at least have given her career a welcome boost.

The music, however, is another matter altogether.

Quite simply, the less of it there had been, the better.

"Aaila Re", sung by Anu Malik himself, became the film's biggest musical success.

One only hopes that this didn't encourage him to sing more often.

God forbid.