Chulbul Pandey (Salman Khan), Bollywood’s best-loved badass cop, is back. This sequel to one of the biggest ever blockbusters is louder, cruder and just as inane as the 2010 original.
When our ‘fearless’ (as the title translates) hero, his wife Rajjo (Sonakshi Sinha) and child relocate to a new town, Chulbul is outraged to learn that it’s run by a criminal-turned-politician Baccha Bhaiyya (Prakash Raj) and his two thuggish brothers. Naturally, Chulbul sets out to clean up the locality using brute force.
Forget about the dosa-thin ‘good versus evil’ plot, this is a star vehicle to showcase, yet again, Salman Khan’s questionable acting skills and his gym-bunny body. In that respect, this potboiler delivers the punch. Khan’s hammy antics will delight his devoted (mostly teenage male) fans, admiring his washboard pecs as he trashes baddies.
This represents everything that is laughable about masala Bollywood movies and glorifies rampant ‘macho’ behaviour in sexist modern Indian society. You will either get excited or embarrassed when a pouty diva (Kareena Kapoor) in a spicy ‘item’ dance number does the trademark pelvic thrusts whilst referring to herself as a hot ‘tandoor’ (oven). This tikka-turkey might prove festive fun – but only for its target audience.