Awarapan comes from the stables of ace movie mavericks, Mukesh Bhatt and Mahesh Bhatt, famous for crafting Bollywood's biggest musical hits, Zeher, Woh Lamhe and Gangster.
Shot in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Pakistan, Awarapan is an intense and compelling drama about love, passion and betrayal with a chart-busting soundtrack that features for the first time an array of top-notch music artistes from Pakistan.
Awarapan tracks the journey of Shivam (Emraan Hashmi), a godless heartbroken boy who has never known or felt love. In order to escape the ghosts of his tragic past, Shivam dedicates himself to serve his gangster boss in Hong Kong with unflinching correctness and loyalty. His boss trusts him enough to ask him to keep an eye on his alluring girlfriend, Reema (Mrinalini Sharma) whom he has kept away from the eyes of his adversaries.
Shivam's heart melts on seeing her innocence and vulnerability, as he is able to draw parallels with his girlfriend from the past (Shreya Saran). The atheist turns into a believer and begins smiling and responding to life. Reema gives Shivam reason to believe that she likes him. Existence begins to blush for Shivam but only till the reality dawns on him that Reema has a secret lover tucked away and was planning to elope with him. Her game was merely a smoke- screen created to gain freedom.
A shattered Shivam is in a dilemma on realizing that he has been heartlessly used - does he inform his boss or does he earn his wrath by helping his unrequited love to achieve the freedom she yearns for? If anything, 'Awarapan' showcases the acting talent of Emraan Hashmi. The actor steps out of his usual chocolate boy image and plays a very serious and intense role with full conviction. He may not be the deadliest looker around, but he sure does know the art of restraining and underplaying his characters. And his performance in 'Awarapan' proves that he is one of the under-rated talents in Bollywood.
Mrinalini Sharma overacts in certain scenes, but manages to play her part fairly well on the whole. Shriya Saran's acting looks very natural. She looks very comfortable playing the brief role she has in the film. Ashutosh Rana is another actor who delivers a superb performance.
Mohit Suri succeeds to a great extent in translating an interesting story on celluloid. There are many scenes and sequences (like confrontation between Emraan and Aaliya's father, or Emraan's final sequence with Ashutosh Rana) that are intelligently conceived. The cinematography is visually appealing and the music (by Pritam) is also good.
On the whole, 'Awarapan' is worth watching once.
