Raajneeti
Tags: allegory, violence, murder, romantic

Plot synopsis:
The film begins with the life of Bharti Rai the daughter of chief minister Ramnath Rai. Influenced by leftist ideology, she rebels against her father and joins the rival party of leftist leader Bhaskar Sanyal . Bharti develops an illicit relationship with Bhaskar, who, guilt-ridden over taking advantage of the younger woman, leaves for parts unknown, having unwittingly gotten Bharti pregnant. Upon the child's birth, he is abandoned in a boat by Brij Gopal Bharti's brother. This leaves her devastated. Bharti later marries Chandra Pratap, the younger brother of Bhanu Pratap . Bhanu leads the Rashtrawadi political party. The story tooks a turn, when the state government collapses and Bhanu suffers a stroke. In the hospital, he hands over power to his brother Chandra. Chandra's son, Prithviraj Pratap tries to take advantage of his father's power and starts to impose his own decisions on the party, which results in a clash with Veerendra Pratap. Chandra also take side of his son, sidelining Virendra. When Prithvi rejects the nomination of a local leader, Sooraj Kumar, who is chosen by the common people, Virendra gives his support to Suraj. Unknown to all, Suraj is Bharti's abandoned son, who was found and whose upbringing was done by Pratap's family driver Ram Charittar. Then comes the younger son of Chandra, Samar Pratap from America and meets his childhood friend Indu . Indu loves Samar and thinks he loves her too. When Chandra and Prithvi try to kick Virendra out of his father's party, he ask Sooraj for help. Sooraj ends up assassinating Chandra in his car, while he is returning from the airport after seeing off his younger son, Samar. In an ensuing drama, Prithvi is arrested by police under the influence of Veerendra and put on trial for raping a party worker. Samar comes to the rescue and tricks Veerendra into dropping all charges upon his brother, promising that his brother will resign and that he will move with his family to the U.S. However, Samar does not keep his promise and he, with Prithvi, begins rallying public support. After that Bhanu officially expels Prithvi, the latter splits from the Rashtrawadi party and contests elections under "Jana Shakti party", a new party with Gopal as his mentor and Samar as the executive. Meanwhile, Samar's American girlfriend Sarah (Sarah Thompson) arrives in India to see the situation. To raise funds for the new party, Samar shrewdly ensures Prithvi's marriage to Indu. Though Indu had always loved Samar, Samar only thought of Indu as a friend and loved Sarah.
The circumstances gets murkier with both sides trying every trick to ensure their victory in upcoming elections. Allegations and counter-allegations are made. Subsequently, Samar uncovers that the real murderers of his father are Sooraj and Veerendra, and decides to take revenge. On the other hand, Prithvi executes the former police officer, who had arrested him, and the woman worker at a farmhouse. Veerendra again seeks help from Sooraj and Sooraj makes a plan to assassinate Samar, being aware that Samar was behind all the tricks .A car bomb is planted in Samar's car. Prithvi goes to save Samar and Sarah, who were to be dropped off at the airport in that car. He manages to save Samar but is killed while trying to save Sarah in vain. Devastated by the loss of his brother and girlfriend, Samar decides to retaliate. He suggests Indu to take the reins of the party and arranges the election campaign single-handedly.
Meanwhile, Sooraj is revealed to be the first child of Bharti, who implores him to join his younger brother Samar. Sooraj refuses to part ways with Veerendra and asks his mother to leave. Exit polls predict a victory for Indu's party. On the counting day, Samar lures Veerendra and Sooraj to an unused factory by spreading a rumour about electronic voting machines being hacked. They fall in the trap, and Veerendra gets shot by Samar and his men. Sooraj has an open opportunity to shoot Samar, but can't bring himself to do it since he knows Samar is his brother. Sooraj requests Samar to leave him and Veerendra till they reach the hospital, but Veerendra dies on the way. Gopal prompts Samar to shoot Sooraj who questions the morality of the act, but Gopal convinces him to take revenge for the destruction of his family. Samar shoots Sooraj.
The election results are declared, and Indu emerges with majority and becomes CM. Samar is seen asking forgiveness and is seen attempting reconciliation with Indu. They show Indu accepting Samar's apology and the two reconciling. Explaining his decision to return to America, he reflects that he always wanted to stay away from politics as politics is a game that brings out the "inner devil]]. Indu is revealed to be pregnant with Prithvi's child, while Samar leaves India to look after Sarah's mother and settle there.

Review: An ensemble cast comprising of Nana Patekar, Ajay Devgan, Manoj Bajpai, Arjun Rampal, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Naseeruddin Shah and an impressive lot of others play today's warriors in the great battlefield of Indian politics.
Anyone can turn against anyone or may be kill each other just for greed of votes.5) Public is a complete moron; people vote for that person who gives them a cunning speech and not to that person who genuinely wants good for them.6) There are no human beings in politics, just a bunch of 'escaped-from-hell' devils fighting against each other to attain powers not for using for benefit of public but for personal greediness.I am not sure whether the things I concluded are correct but you will sense trueness in them once you watch this movie.
Prakash Jha( Mrityudand, GangaJal and Apaharan), famous for making movies on serious topics and getting success for every film, fails this time.
But, in Raajneeti he did a different thing, he assembled a huge star cast with every actor having a potential of pulling of any movie well and a strong topic: politics, which was great but he didn't give preference to MAIN story this time which went wrong.Raajneeti is supposedly based on the epic Mahabharata in which brothers went for a long brutal war against each other because of their personal differences.
Prakash Jha had so much scope of showing the inside story of the dirty politics going on in the country, people would have been satisfied with that but we all know there very few politicians who come from the same family or may be there is no one.
So, instead of showing the movie on politics Prakash Jha ended up making a movie in which a group of brothers play conspiracies against each other to become the group leader.I am not indicating that Raajneeti was a complete failure.
The film had so many brilliant actors that Prakash Jha didn't do full justice with everyone, he wanted to include everything in his movie: romance, suspense, and some scenes which were completely unexpected and unwanted.I know you will watch this film, so there is no point of saying anything on this but yeah this film has its moments which will remind you of old Prakash Jha. That's why I say he didn't go for politics, he went for polymorphism!
It feels like a typical Hindi movie with no character development, no good story, there was neither any twist nor any surprises to audience.
Its a brother kill brother world out there.Acting wise everyone has done a good job I must say but special credit goes to Ranbir Kapoor who has shown that he can actually act in films other than romantic comedies in which he plays a chocolate boy lover trying to woo a girl standing in the balcony.
Dialogues were average and seemed stupid in many scenes, like the conversation between Ajay Devgan and Ranbeer's mother, and the conversation between Katrina and Ranbeer in one of the last scenes where she announces her pregnancy.Arjun Rampal was looking out of place, and wasn't carrying the aggression and rawness required for his character, he was too polished.
Dialogues and character development is the basic flaw along with not so good editing, or the movie could have been very good.That scene of Arjun Rampal after killing the police officer was executed well and had the necessary terror element, however there was so much of blood bath in the movie that it came and went like an ordinary scene.Nana Patekar was OK in his role.I would rate 6 out of 10..
Came after watching Prakash Jha's latest offering "Raajneeti" starring Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Arjun Rampal and Ajay Devgan in the lead...
While watching this movie you will get a feeling that the whole plot and characters are heavily inspired from the epic story Mahabharatham and the classic "The Godfather"..."Raajneeti" is basically a complex game of politics where human relationships are challenged to achieve the ultimate power...Story rolls on with a flashback where, Bhaskar played by Naseruddin Shah, an old leftist, challenging the most powerful leaders together with the support of a young lady who considers him as God..
Duration of the film should have been taken care of by some trimming...On the whole, watch Raajneeti for the sincerity with which Prakash Jha has made this film and also for the excellent performances put up from Ranbir, Arjun, Ajay, Katrina and Nana Patekar...Verdict : Contemporary Mahabharatha..
Ranbir is above average, Katrina obviously still can't act, Arjun Rampal is the shining underdog, Patekar good, Manoj and Ajay at the same level: that isn't necessarily bad!
After all, it has references such as the bloody bed scene (without involving a horse head), deaths of similar characters, and of course, the story of the rise of the youngest, most promising child of the household, here played by Ranbir Kapoor, into the bitter orchestrator of his political party's campaign for the Chief Ministership, complete with an overpowering vendetta of revenge and honour.
Ranbir's Samar Pratap role is perhaps the juiciest of the lot here, given his transformation into someone cold and calculated, who will not hesitate to give up his emotions in order to manipulate others into doing his bidding, all moves played out like a chess game in order to advance his cause.And the other persona in the film given a transformation at that level, is Katrina Kaif's Indu, an impetuous girl deeply in love with Samar, who also has to give up feelings more as a matter of instruction by her industrialist father, who sees donations to political campaigns and marriages as a sealing of alliances for favours and benefits, highlighting the clout that campaign donators wield over the politicians they support.
What more, these are the two characters that experience change, much unlike the others who play seasoned politicians who are entrenched into the way they work and operate, leaving room for schemes to enter through the blind side, in a game of threats and counterthreats that you can easily see looming, to gain the upper hand leading to ballots being cast.Prakash Jha crafts a web of character relationships that you'll need to mind-map as the film moves along, introducing key characters and influencers in this family dynasty politics, where the early generation of alliance between brothers, break out into a power struggle for party leadership amongst the next generation between cousins.
It's an extremely dirty business, and it's somehow a sneak peek into how Indian politics get played.The ensemble cast shouldn't be overlooked as well, with Arjun Rampal's Prithviraj the hot- headed brother of Samar who on one hand is being propelled to lead his breakaway party and yet having a character that's less than noble, and Manoj Bajpai is excellent as Veerendra Pratap who's constantly finding himself not in the driver's seat of events, and have to rely on heavy muscle to keep the competition away.
Nana Patekar's Brij Gopal also shined as the unfailing mentor who has experience to count on in his repertoire of tricks up his sleeve, and has a key role to play in the falling out of the established dynasty.I suppose a film like this cannot possibly be made here until our state of industry and politics mature to a stage where filmmakers can tell a story without the innate fear of harassment, though Jha did get requests by the censors to tone down some scenes and change some dialogues, which was complied with.
Thrilling,exciting & what not..this movie has certainly set a landmark for Indian cinema.Director Prakash Jha has taken 5 years since his last film & seeing rajneeti, i can say that he used the time really well to come up with a film of this stature.
Others are good..nana patekar & manoj vajpayee are big stalwarts & katrina kaif played her part of the politician willing to do anything(apart from seducing ranbir) to help her family's political ambitions..
The acting was great, with talents like Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpai, Ajay Devgn and Ranbir Kapoor.
KARNA is the most powerful warrior and most focused person in MAHABHARAT, on the other hand Devgan in the movie was confused, it was not sure if he wanted to uplift DALITS or just wanted to become there leader or just wanted to lick feet of Duryodhan (Manoj) >Nana Patekar tried to play Krishna but lack any kind of spark...
Rajneeti is an ambitious, engaging, entertaining, pertinent, and well made film, though at times clichéd and theatrical.The ensemble cast delivers above expectation, especially the consummate performance by Ranbir Kapoor and aided by the adept ones by Manoj Bajpai, Ajay Devgan, and Nana Patekar ; Arjun Rampal is also surprisingly convincing, with the performances by the female cast ranging from the adequate to the weak.Further, while the director and screenwriters do a skillful job of weaving the political commentary (mostly accurate albeit broadly generalizing), the moralizing (unwelcome and hackneyed), the scheming and vendettas, and the classical mythos (its main inspiration is the epic Mahabharata), into an entertaining and finely paced film; however, it's somewhat protracted and overly theatrical second half, lowers the intensity, with the generalizations and pauses detracting from its focus and the theatrical violence lowering its credibility, which coupled with an ending that's rather tame and platitudinous, the film falls short of the masterpiece category.Nonetheless, in an industry where condescending, vapid and "timepass" movies are the rule, and political correctness construed as deference and social aloofness, Rajneeti is a relatively bold, refreshingly frank, and an entertaining exception.Kudos to Prakash Jha and the production team for their ambitious, riveting, and fine piece of work..
Touted as Prakash Jha's take on Indian Politics with inspirations from Mahabharata as well as The Godfather,the movie turns out to be a disappointment.
No doubt Katrina acts well in her difficult role of a one sided lover, still I found her stressing more on her political appearance scenes than the other ones.Musically the film has no place for songs and therefore the few tracks are well used in bits and parts running in the background.
Only keeping Ajay Devgan's character apart (which I feel could have been more powerful), all the other characters in the script are able to leave a solid impact on the viewer only because of a balanced script and direction.But before watching this Prakash Jha's modern-day epic, you must get prepared for its rough, dry and cunning treatment of the subject which truly justifies its title called "Raajneeti".
Though there were rumors in the media before its release that the theme of the movie will be based on Mahabharat but no body had imagined that even based on a somehow similar theme the movie has been able to perform well on commercial aspects and all credit goes to the Director Prakash Jha. Also the stunning performances by the intense Ajay Devgan,Manoj Bajpayee, Nana Patekar.
Naseer is just superb in his role as a revolutionary even if it was small,Nana Patekar shows us why he's still regarded as one of the finest actors even when he doesn't has to speak much,Arjun Rampal ,Ajay Devgan and Manoj Vajpayee too hold their acts together.Katrina's lovely to watch sans much glamour and Ranbir Kapoor too portrays his journey from a rank outsider to a shrewd calculator of the game of politics brilliantly...The music of the movie esp the background scores are at par the other aspects and having 4 composers for 4 diff songs in a single movie also works well In all if you love good cinema and not those mindless ones, u r in for a really good treat my ratings 4.2/5 .
In the acting department Nana Patekar shines and is undeniably the best actor in the movie.The movie to be fair seems a shameless rip off from films like Virasat, Sarkar, Sarakar Raj among many others.Jha would have served his cause better by sticking to his own style of storytelling and not resorting to plagiarism in a subdued form.The movie in it's style and presentation hardly comes close to being titled a Prakash Jha work.
as individual character ....tremendous job by nana patekar , katrina looks stunning , bit of overacting by ajay but still fantabulous expression,ranbir improving day by day ,arjun's career best after rock on long awaited manoj also looks good .....
Raajneeti directed by Prakash Jha is just brilliant.The story is very good.The screenplay is well penned by Prakash Jha and Anjum Rajabali.It manages to be watertight right from start to end.Talking about the length of the movie,the movie is a bit lengthy which have could be shortened.But in short,it is a must watch.The movie has only one song,which is good.Performances-Each actor deserves a special mention.But the ones who stand out are Ranbir Kapoor,Arjun Rampal and Manoj Bajpayee.Ranbir is excellent.Arjun Rampal is outstanding!Such an amazing actor.Manoj Bajpayee is terrific.
But yes, there have been Flawless, Outstanding Performances by Arjun Rampal, Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpai but above all, Ranbir Kapoor surprises and impresses you by delivering the Best Performance in the Film.
you are surely going to love this movie because of its heavy script and powerful dialogues!!!!The Audience may react to it lukewarmly but actually its a powerful movie!!!rajneeti has that charm that keeps you going through the movie..the ending is a bit disappointing but throughout the movie you will enjoy the excellent acting skills portrayed by ranbir,katrina,nana patekar,manoj bajpai and others.....Politics---the dark side has never been acknowledged in any movie but rajneeti has done it once again..!!!!!!!!!!!!!Loved it thoroughly.....Worth watching!!!!!!!
Each and every actor performed to their fullest potential.Manoj bajpai,Nana patekar,Ajay Devan are their usual best.Arjun rampal is a surprise package.Katreena is good.But the clear winner is Ranbeer kapoor.he gave the performance of his lifetime.The movie have some very strong one liners.watch the kabhi ankhiya churao act by rampal.This is one movie that each and everyone must watch.Don't give it a miss,Mahabharata returns in new avatar.10 on 10..
If you are Looking for a change from Typical Prakash Jha Films....den ma friend u should catch this flick.One of the Best Directions seen so far the movie has it all.Its a Turmoil or better yet a " Hurricane " of Emotions...Action....Drama...n POLITICS.This movie depicts the face of MODERN Indian Political System.Jha Beautifully has somewhat adapted The Masterpiece "Epic"...Mahabharata..Into his Direction n created this Flick with a mix of all.SO final verdict.It gets a decent 8.5\10.Catch It...You will Love it..
In fact from the way the movie starts it looks like its gonna be a sooraj (the director took so much time developing this character and his back story) movie but then something happens and we don't see him for almost an hour.
This film is a ruthless political Mahabharata set on a grand stage---the politics of north India ,the heartland of the planets largest democracy.There is a Kunti ( i did not catch the name of the actress ) ,who gives birth to Karan (Ajay Devgan ) ,begotten from Suryadev ( Naseeruddin shah )..................and true enough , the Karna grows up as a Sutputra ( son of a Mercedes driver ,to suit the modern era) ,to take the side of Duryodhan ( Manoj Bajpai), in his battle against Yudhisthir ( Arjun Rampal ) and his arch rival through the ages ,Arjun ( played with aplomb by Ranbir Kapoor ),who are helped by Krishna ( Nana Patekar ).....and there is even a Draupadi ( Katrina Kaif ) ,who gets tossed between brothers.the lesson for the modern era--politics is dirty ,and not even can the good people let their hands remain unclean in the process.......the lesson from the Mahabharat---victory in a brutal war can be won only on a pile of dead bodies.........nobody is really a good person here---neither Yudhistir ,nor Arjun.........the show is undoubtedly stolen by Ranbir Kapoor ,who plays a suave behind-the-scenes political operator with a cold-hearted bent ( shades of Michael Corleone from godfather ) to perfection .Nana gives a restrained performance ,Arjun Rampal is handsome ( who said he does not look good ?
) ,katrina .........in the end she acts more like Sonia Gandhi in sari and foreign accent ......but Ajay Devgan is not at his best.the characters may be in the mold of the Mahabharata ( they are not really named Arjun Kunti etc in the movie ,they are just playing their roles ) ,but some fighting scenes are copied from the godfather .sadly ,women's position has not changed from ancient times--they are just pawns in political games.........and the men ,even the best ,love their politics more than their women ........but they all look good ,especially Katrina ......she looks oh-so-divine......so does Ranbirs foreign wife......verdict-----satisfying.
Cast is very strong starting from Naseer, Nana Patekar, Ajay Devgan, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Arjun Rampal, Manoj Vajpayee and so on.
Rajneeti,the multi starer movie by Prakash Jha lives up to the expectation of people who have never seen Godfather & Mahabharatha.For the rest of the people who have seen both will never be satisfied with this film.Most of the relations & the concept is based on the epic Mahabharatha.Also political games played in Mahabharatha have been shown here as well.And a lot of scenes have been simply copied from the Godfather.The movie looks good in the beginning but then its the same old ending you can always make out.The movie prolongs or stretches in numerous occasions.The movie & a multi starer has overshadowed some great performances like that of Ajay Devgan.These kind of movies,he always lives up to the expectations but his role is not fairly that big enough.Nana Patekar again was good.Manoj Vajpayee was excellent.Arjun Rampal looked like a college politician,he never looked a chief minister.Also,Ranbir Kapoor looks very slow to react and hardly has any presence on the screen.Katrina Kaif is good but only in some parts.Overall the movie is a bit shabby & you can predict it from the beginning.Prakash Jha delivers but both Apaharan & Gangaajal were far better then this.In short,if you have not seen Mahabharatha & Godfather then you can go for this.But beware,after watching this first you might loose a lot from the suspense of Godfather & the epic Mahabharatha..