Director: Zoya Akhtar
Rating: ****
This is the first time when a mainstream Bollywood film has been made on the lives of underground rappers. The rap scene in India has just started to flourish and with 'Gully Boy', it will certainly reach new heights.
The story of Gully Boy revolves around Murad (Ranveer Singh) and his life struggle. Murad lives in Dharavi, with his mother (Amruta Subhash), grandmother and abusive father (Vijay Raaz), who is a chauffeur and has brought home a new wife, a little older form Murad.
While Murad struggles with his life and poverty, he has a possessive yet lovable girlfriend Safeena (Alia Bhatt), who is a hot-head and studying Medical to become a surgeon. Both are in the same college.
Besides studying in the day Murad does some dodgy jobs at night with his friend Moin (Vijay Verma) and Salman (Nakul Sahdev).
Amidst this hustle, Murad finds peace in his poetry and is in love with rap music.
In his college only he sees MC Sher (Sidhant Chaturvedi) and then through Facebook he gets to meet him at a cypher organized by MC Sher, where Murad asks MC Sher to belt out his poetry and Sher refuses by saying "it's your poetry and if you are not reciting it then why should I?". Murad recites his poetry for the first time and everyone is impressed.
MC Sher encourages Murad to pursue his dream and turns mentor to him. He teaches Murad the technicality of rapping and how to take on the world with bare hands. He also gives Murad his stage name 'Gully Boy'.
Murad gets into rapping wholeheartedly and records his song and uploads it on YouTube, where he meets a music producer who is studying music in the USA, Shweta aka Sky (Kalki Koechlin). Sky offers Murad and Sher to collaborate and they record their music video.
But Murad's struggle is still not over and he continues his fight with a patriarchal society, which thinks "Naukar Ka Beta Nauka Banega".
In the time where Bollywood filmmakers are trying the tested formula of success, Zoya Akhtar has delivered something special and something which will surely give a nudge to many filmmakers to come out of their comfort zone and try something new, something different.
Reema Kagti and Zoya Akhtar had done a great job in writing along with Vijay Maurya (Dialogue Writer) and Vasundra Koshy.
Ranveer Singh as Murad has nailed it. His accent, his looks, his verses, everything is on point and he has brilliantly aced his character. He has proved his mettle, that he can do anything no matter what.
Alia Bhatt as Safeena is brilliant. Her Mumbai dialect completely compliments her character in the movie.
All the characters in the film have done their job brilliantly, whether it's Vijay Raaz as a hopeless abusive father, Amruta Subhash as Murad's mother, Vijay Verma as neighbourhood crook and friend of Murad, or Kalki as Sky, all are brilliant on their parts. But one actor who has won hearts with his debut performance is Siddhant Chaturvedi as MC Sher. There are instances in the film where he has clearly overshadowed Ranveer Singh. His rap verses and mannerism is completely winning hearts.
Overall, Gully Boy is a film which is not just about the underground hip-hop scene in India but also takes on patriarchal society.
