Liger is a cross between Netflix series Cobra Kai, Toofan and Never Back Down, with a bit of Baaghi thrown in. In short, this Puri Jagannadh-directed movie is a recipe for cringe and disaster.
The Vijay Deverakonda-starrer film is full of exaggeration. From its fight scenes to romance to the trope of how women ‘ruin and trap’ men are all exaggerated. At no point does the film make you want to find out what comes next. You keep hoping it will get better. It never does.
Balamani, played by Ramya Krishnan and her son Liger (Vijay Deverokonda) move from Karimnagar to Mumbai so that he can become an MMA (mixed martial arts) champion. He stammers and is ridiculed until his fists shut people up. He is trained by Ronit Roy in Jeet Kune Do, a martial arts philosophy.
Enter Tanya, played by Ananya Pandey, and all hell breaks loose. She is exactly the type of woman Balamani warns her son about—the devil who seduces ‘poor, innocent’ guys like Liger. What happens after this makes up the rest of the movie.
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Boredom redefined
The less said about the script, the better. It is so random, my late night thoughts seem more coherent.
What starts off as an underdog, street-smart man making it big loses itself within 15 minutes. The logical climax is over within a few minutes in the second half. Everything after that is a forced hour of nationalistic fervour and sports.
Liger has absolutely no soul, and is so frivolous that you feel second hand embarrassment for everyone who has worked in the film.
It’s not even a good love story. Every time Liger and Tanya are on screen, you wish you had a Disprin tablet at hand. There is no chemistry between them.
It’s like no one even tried to write a script and simply tore off pages from multiple terrible commercial potboilers. There is no sequence to the movie. In fact, had the scenes been arranged even a bit more properly, just maybe the film would have been bearable.
Add to it the songs that come on screen for no rhyme or reason. Deverakonda dances like a dream but Ananya can’t match up.
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Wasted cast
One wonders what Vijay Deverakonda is doing in a film like this. The Dear Comrade and Arjun Reddy actor cannot salvage the film with his performance. He looks delectable and the work done on his physique is incredible. The fight scenes are thrilling. But that’s where the fun part ends.
The best scenes are when Liger is being beaten up by a gang of women who are infinitely better MMA fighters.
Ananya Pandey plays an airhead influencer Tanya to perfection. The depth of her shallowness is so exaggerated that it’s comic and cringe. Her character looks strangely out of place in the movie and seems to be in a Student of the Year hangover. Tha airheadedness doesn’t become enduring at any point. Her body language is stiff.
Ramya Krishnan as Liger’s mother is at her fiery best. She manages to convince you about her passion and struggle to see her son become an MMA champion. But all you wonder is what she is doing in the film.
In the top of the list of ‘what is he/she doing’ here, is Mike Tyson. Maybe the lure of being in an Indian film is so strong that you’ll choose just about any film. There seems to be no other reason for Tyson to appear in Liger.
The film also ends so abruptly that you scratch your head for a bit, trying to figure if you had accidentally dozed off and missed a few minutes of it. Liger is a movie that should never have been made. It makes Baaghi 2 look pleasant in comparison.