Maximum Review

Two of Mumbai’s most infamous encounter cops are trying to dominate each other. Find out how the story plays in Maximum.

Rating: 1/5 stars (One star)

Star cast: Sonu Sood, Naseeruddin Shah, Neha Dhupia, Vinay Pathak, Anjana Sukhani, Aarya Babbar, Swanand Kirkire, Amit Sadh, Mohan Agashe and Rajendra Gupta.

What’s Good: The acting.

What’s Bad: The uninteresting story and screenplay; the half-baked characters.

Verdict: Maximum is a dry and insipid fare.

Watch or Not?: Not really.

It’s Mumbai circa 2003 and the police have their grip hold on the city thanks to their ruthless encounter killings. Pratap Pandit (Sonu Sood) heads his team of policemen, informers and small time thugs in cleaning up the crime syndicate in Mumbai and filling his pocket as well.

Another cop trying to beat Pratap at the number game is the senior police officer Arun Inamdar (Naseeruddin Shah). While Pratap has the support of minister Tiwari (Vinay Pathak), Inamdar has another minister (Mohan Agashe) by his side.

How these two cops use encounters and the politicians for their benefit is shown in the rest of the movie.

Maximum Review: Script Analysis

Kabeer Kaushik has written the script, screenplay and directed the movie. Unfortunately, the movie doesn’t tell you anything new. We’ve had many movies on encounters, cops and the underworld, and Kabeer has just recycled old material. How can cops kill so indiscriminately and not get pulled up by their seniors or the media? Many questions like these remain unanswered. Also, one never feels anything for the half-fledged characters. Dialogues are not up to the mark.

Maximum Review: Star Performances

Sonu Sood has tried his best, but cannot rise above the script. Naseeruddin Shah’s character is well played but seems half-baked. Neha Dhupia is apt as Pratap’s wife. Vinay Pathak, Swanand Kirkire (as Bachi Singh), Mohan Agashe, Rajendra Gupta (as Pratap’s dad) provide adequate support.

Maximum Review: Music and Technical Aspects

Amjad Nadeem and Devi Shri Prasad’s music is good as is Daniel George’s background score. Tinu Verma’s action is just alright. Krishna Ramanan’s cinematography is fine. Lionel Fernandes’ editing could have been a lot better.

Maximum Review: The Last Word

Maximum just beats around the bush for a long time and is not really an enjoyable fair.

Maximum Trailer

Maximum releases on 29 June 2012.