‘Bhawar’ is a sensational and absurd Bollywood production that tells a simple moral tale about what it means to be a real man. Directed by Nitesh Tiwari (“Dhangal”), this globe-trotting romance, like many Bollywood movies, is deliberately over the top. But this is not very interesting.
Ajay (Varun Dhawan), an elementary school history teacher, is interested in only one thing. It’s about looking good. Perfectly groomed and chiseled, he doesn’t seem to care that his students aren’t studying or that his wife Nisha (Yanvi Kapoor) is hopelessly unhappy.
Ajay keeps Nisha out of sight and at home with her parents. She has epilepsy and she fears her image will be tarnished if she has a seizure in public. Ajay gets her suspension for slapping her student, but she hatches a plan to prove her educational worth. He heads to Europe, where he gives video lectures from various historical sites to students in his small Indian home town.
Nisha accompanies despite Ajay’s protests and proves herself capable. In Europe, she’s much more capable, and of course more beautiful, than Ajay thought, while he, in the sleepy comic relief part, is a victim of lost luggage, pickpockets, and sleazy exchange rates. And so on, suffering from minor travel difficulties.
Ajay becomes more compassionate with each step of his journey. A monochrome fantasy his sequence plunges him and Nisha into battle on the Normandy coast. In another photo they are victims of the Auschwitz gas chambers. It’s a terrible metaphor for the dire state of their relationship, and one of the film’s many unfulfilled key directions.
Dhawan (too persuasive to convince a narcissist, successful change of heart) and Kapoor (uncharismatic) don’t get along well, and aren’t really rooting for Ajay enough to hope Nisha wins. . The film’s macho-marriage-saving traditionalism may be off-putting to some viewers — especially since without some hearty laughter and stakes, little else would be acceptable.
Bawal
Unrated. Running time: 2 hours 17 minutes. Watch on Prime Video.
