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Released in cinemas in 1985, Shiva ka Insaaf was touted as the first Hindi 3D
movie (since the previous year's Chota Chetan - which remains for most Indians in
that era the defining 3D experience - was only dubbed into Hindi from
the original Malayalam My Dear Kuttichathan). While I never actually saw it in 3D at the
cinemas, I did see it on VHS in that period.
Shiva ka Insaaf is a comic book type movie, with leading man Jackie Shroff playing a masked vigilante hero called Shiva and his Clark Kent inspired mild-mannered alter ego Bhola; of course, in 80's Bollywood, mild-mannered translates to near-retarded (Bhola shows the intellect of a 10-year old schoolboy, yet is immediately hired as a personal assistant to a newspaper editor). The obvious inspirations for Shiva are Batman (After the hero's parents get murdered by a criminal, he trains for a life dedicated to crime-fighting) and Superman (mild-mannered employee at a newspaper).
The script is all about broad strokes - locations are defined as "gaon" (village) and "shahar" (city). Shiva is brought up by a Hindu-Muslim-Christian triumvirate (while he is shown to visit all the religious shrines, the Hindu component appears dominant, given the avatar he dons and the batarang style mini-tridents he hurls at his enemies). Heroine Poonam Dhillon plays an editor that goes by herself to cover stories, which usually involves sneaking into a shady location, then getting caught and having to be rescued by Shiva. The evil mastermind villain (Shakti Kapoor) runs a poorly defined crime empire, and gets his jollies setting off bombs using a TV remote.
For the action scenes, 3D means there's a good bit of pointing guns, swords and sticks towards the screen, and in the climax Shakti Kapoor and his son (Gulshan Grover) inexplicably start firing flaming arrows at the hero. There is some hilarious use of toy cars, dolls/puppets and very obvious miniatures. Apart from one decent romance number, RD Burman's score is wholly forgettable. But for nostalgics of 80's action masala, Shiva ka Insaaf is not a bad way of spending 2 hours.
Full movie with English subtitles below:
Shiva ka Insaaf is a comic book type movie, with leading man Jackie Shroff playing a masked vigilante hero called Shiva and his Clark Kent inspired mild-mannered alter ego Bhola; of course, in 80's Bollywood, mild-mannered translates to near-retarded (Bhola shows the intellect of a 10-year old schoolboy, yet is immediately hired as a personal assistant to a newspaper editor). The obvious inspirations for Shiva are Batman (After the hero's parents get murdered by a criminal, he trains for a life dedicated to crime-fighting) and Superman (mild-mannered employee at a newspaper).
The script is all about broad strokes - locations are defined as "gaon" (village) and "shahar" (city). Shiva is brought up by a Hindu-Muslim-Christian triumvirate (while he is shown to visit all the religious shrines, the Hindu component appears dominant, given the avatar he dons and the batarang style mini-tridents he hurls at his enemies). Heroine Poonam Dhillon plays an editor that goes by herself to cover stories, which usually involves sneaking into a shady location, then getting caught and having to be rescued by Shiva. The evil mastermind villain (Shakti Kapoor) runs a poorly defined crime empire, and gets his jollies setting off bombs using a TV remote.
For the action scenes, 3D means there's a good bit of pointing guns, swords and sticks towards the screen, and in the climax Shakti Kapoor and his son (Gulshan Grover) inexplicably start firing flaming arrows at the hero. There is some hilarious use of toy cars, dolls/puppets and very obvious miniatures. Apart from one decent romance number, RD Burman's score is wholly forgettable. But for nostalgics of 80's action masala, Shiva ka Insaaf is not a bad way of spending 2 hours.
Full movie with English subtitles below:
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