Aditya Dhar’s “Dhurandhar” showed the shrewd rise of Hamza Ali Mazari, a musclebound Indian undercover agent in Pakistan who becomes part Karachi gangster, part political player. Its seductive, well-orchestrated mix of mafia-style feuds, electoral maneuvering and flush-from-the-club romance drew record-breaking box office. Now Dhar’s rampaging sequel, “Dhurandhar the Revenge,” with the leonine Ranveer Singh returning as Hamza, amps up the ultraviolence and the provocative mingling of heroic theatrics with India-Pakistan history.
Where “Dhurandhar” stages dramas of infiltration and strategy, “Revenge” feels more like a series of tit-for-tat killings, as Hamza consolidates power and gets a freer hand from his superiors in India. His mission is antiterrorist, but that can be lost amid the bloodlust of his shadow war, which encompasses allies and adversaries. Captions name-check actual terrorist attacks on India, while the plot incorporates a 2016 ban on large currency bills and the swaggering dialogue lifts rhetoric from Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Married to a politico’s daughter, Hamza increasingly risks exposure of his original identity as Jaskirat, a recruited (clean-shaven) convict who avenges his sisters in a brutal flashback. How that early sequence escalates — from tactical home invasion to grisly kills — signals this film’s approach. Numbing violence routinely features burning people alive and point-blank executions, along with threats to wipe out bloodlines. (The music feels less like punchy needle-drops than the background to gaming, which one first-person-shooter flourish evokes.)
The first installment’s critics might think this sequel further desensitizes viewers to violence along national or religious lines. It’s a movie of the current moment, which isn’t exactly a comfort.
Dhurandhar the Revenge Not rated. Running time: 3 hours 55 minutes. In theaters.
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