Shivaay

Shivaay
Film poster
Directed by	Ajay Devgan
Produced by	Ajay Devgan
Written by	Sandeep Srivastava Robin Bhatt
Story by	Ajay Devgan
Starring	Ajay Devgan Sayesha Saigal Erika Kaar Abigail Eames Vir Das Girish Karnad Saurabh Shukla
Music by	Mithoon
Cinematography	Aseem Bajaj
Edited by	Dharmendra Sharma
Production company	Ajay Devgn FFilms Pen India Limited NH Studioz
Distributed by	Reliance Entertainment
Release dates	28 October 2016 (2016-10-28)[1]
Running time	158 minutes
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Budget	₹85–105 crore[2]
Box office	est. ₹146.18 crore[3]

Shivaay is a 2016 Indian action thriller film directed and produced by Ajay Devgan under his banner Ajay Devgn FFilms. It features Ajay Devgn, Sayyeshaa Saigal, and Erika Kaar in lead roles. Mithoon has composed the film's score and soundtrack.^[4] British band The Vamps and composer Jasleen Royal are also a part of the music.^[5]

Shivaay was released on 28 October 2016 on the Diwali weekend.^[1]

Plot

The film opens with a Himalayan mountaineer, Shivaay, rapelling down a steep and dangerous cliff in the Himalayas. Shivaay lives alone in a small house in the mountains and makes a living by providing treks and climbing expeditions to tourists. On one such trek he meets the beautiful Olga, a student from Bulgaria and saves her from an avalanche. They eventually fall in love. Olga becomes pregnant. He implores her to remain in India with him, but despite her love for Shivaay, Olga does not want the child.. She wants to return to Bulgaria and asks Shivaay to return with her but he cannot adapt to that life. He begs her to give him the child after which he will not stop her. Olga has a beautiful daughter, Gaura, who looks just like her mother, and asks Shivaay to tell the daughter that her mother passed away, and leaves India forever.

Eight years later Shivaay leads a happy life with Gaura in the mountains. There is a turn when Gaura discovers her mother's last letter and confronts Shivaay and insists to be taken to Bulgaria. Shivaay and Gaura arrive in Sofia and begin looking for Olga. During this time Shivaay discovers that young children are being trafficked through Bulgaria. He saves one young child and this is reported in the press. Shivaay requests the Indian embassy for help in tracing Olga and is assigned to Anu, an eager young officer at the embassy. The traffickers, led by the baron Ustinov and his right hand man, the unseen Changez, come after Shivaay and kidnap Gaura. Shivaay chases the van destroying various cars and causing the unintentional death of a police officer in the process. He loses the van and is arrested by the Bulgarian police and charged with murder and trafficking. The latter charge is applied because he was never married to Olga and the police therefore refuse to believe that Gaura, who is fair skinned, is his own daughter.

Shivaay breaks out of the police transport killing another officer in the process and reaches Anu who advises him to surrender. The other embassy officer explains that the trafficking trade is worth billions and is operated by very dangerous men with deep police and political connections. Shivaay meets Anu privately but she alerts the cops and Shivaay is nearly arrested again. He escapes and disappears into the streets. He visits various slums and brothels asking about his daughter and ends up busting open a small flesh trade den and liberating many young children. Anu is shocked at Shivaay's rage until her own father explains that they are merely the actions of a desperate father. When Shivaay brings one of the saved prostitutes to Anu's home and asks Anu to help her out, Anu has a complete change of heart and agrees to help Shivaay locate his daughter even if it means going outside legal limits.

Anu and Shivaay seek the help of Anu's wannabe boyfriend and computer hacker Wahab to recover CCTV footage of Shivaay's various chases. Shivaay is able to identify Ivanovich and, through Wahab's computer hacking, is able to lure Ivanovich to a trap. After a vicious fight, Ivanovich reveals Ustinov's location and the reference to Changez. Olga, having now seen television coverage of Shivaay, meets Shivaay and joins the quest to find Gaura. Arriving at Ustinov's mountain lodge, Shivaay finds Ustinov dead, and finds the bodies of various children, who were victims of the organ trade, in the basement. He discovers that Gaura has been taken away to Romania to be sold into the flesh trade. Shivaay deduces that Changez has to be a dirty cop: only a cop would be able to trace the CCTV computer download and thus beat Shivaay to the Ustinov cabin.

Shivaay chases after the transport van carrying his daughter off to Romania. He uses his advanced mountain skills to scale the Balkan mountains near Vidin-Calafat and stop the van. A prolonged and vicious fight ensues as Changez, now revealed to be Captain Nikolai of the Bulgarian Police, attacks Shivaay. After a savage hand-to-hand fight, Shivaay kills Changez with a three-pronged ice stalactite. Gaura is reunited with Olga who is now married to a wealthy Bulgarian and can provide Gaura with every comfort. Shivaay is devastated at the prospect of losing Gaura, but, seeing as Olga now beseeches him, he leaves for the airport with a heavy heart. The film ends as Gaura runs into Shivaay's arms and rips up his tickets before he boards the plane.

Cast

• Ajay Devgan as Shivaay, a tourist guide and mountaineer
• Sayesha Saigal as Anushka, a budding IFS officer at the Indian embassy in Sofia, Bulgaria
• Erika Kaar ^[6] as Olga, Shivaay's former lover and the mother of Gaura
• Abigail Eames as Gaura, Shivaay's young daughter who he got from his former lover, Olga^[7]
• Vir Das^[8] as Wahab, an expert computer hacker who has a crush on Anushka
• Girish Karnad- Anushka's father
• Saurabh Shukla^[9]- Anushka's boss in the Indian embassy in Sofia, Bulgaria
• Bijou Thaangjam^[10] as Kancha, Shivaay's friend.

Production

Filming

The shooting of the film started in November 2014, The major part of movie shot in Mussoorie,.^[11] Bulgaria and Hyderabad.^{[12][13][14][15]}

Release

Shivaay released on 28 October 2016. It released internationally in 60 countries including Germany, France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Denmark, and Chile.^[16] However, the film was not released in Pakistan.^[17]

Film runtime is reduced by 11–12 minutes and new trimmed version is released in cinemas.^[18]

Piracy issue

On 27 October 2016, The Indian Express published that self proclaimed film critic Kamaal R Khan had uploaded the opening sequence of the film on Twitter, which he shot in a theater in Dubai. Devgn, the producer, was quoted saying that he will take legal action against Khan.^[19]

Reception

Critical reception

Bollywood Hungama gave Shivaay 3.5 out of 5 stars. "Shivaay is a perfect emotional thriller that scores high on the account of its breathtaking visuals, amazing action and a high octane performance". The Times of India gave the film 3 stars out of 5, praising the cinematography but criticizing the 3 hr runtime.^[20] Writing for The Hindu, Namrata Joshi commented that the movie moves too slow, and "turns out almost three hours long with just a wisp of a story."^[21] Anna MM Vetticad of Firstpost described the film as heavy-handed, over-stretched film.^[22]

Rating the film 1.5 stars out of 5, Ananya Bhattacharya of IndiaToday.in praised the cinematography but criticized the writing. "The scale of the film is mesmerising as are the action and chase sequences. But good photography and stunts can do only so much to a badly-written film."^[23] Raja Sen of Rediff.com gave the film 1 out 5, calling it an "absolute catastrophe,". Like Bhattacharya, Sen praised the camera work, but levied criticism at the film as promoting Devgn, whom Sen described as "a man who casts himself as invincible and flawless." Sen questioned the believability of the "self-celebrating" character and described the story as an "inane series of car-chases and imbecilic behaviour".^[24] Sukanya Verma of Rediff rated the film 2 stars out of 5, and also described the film as a promotional vehicle for Devgn. "Almost every single scene of its foolish script is designed to showcase his bravado and appeal at the expense of content and coherence." Shubhra Gupta of Indian Express wrote in a 1 out of 5-star review, "The only thing your eye can rest on is the spectacular scenery. The rest is a bloated star vehicle."^[25]

Box office

The four weeks worldwide grossing of film is ₹145.55 crore (US$22 million)^[26]

India

Shivaay was released alongside Karan Johar's romantic drama Ae Dil Hai Mushkil and collected ₹10.24 crore from India on its opening day,^[26] which was less than Ae Dil Hai Mushkil's ₹13.30 crore domestic first day.^[27] Shivaay collected ₹10.06 crore and ₹8.26 crore on second and third day of its release respectively and with that it made its first domestic weekend of a net collection of ₹28.56 crore.^[26] The film collected ₹70.41 crore(Net) during its first week in India. In second weekend the film collected ₹17.09 crore. The four weeks net collection of film is ₹99.80 core in India.^[26] The film grossed ₹100.25 crore in 32 days in India.

Overseas

The film collected ₹4.74 crore (US$700,000) from North America(USA and Canada), ₹78 lakh (US$120,000) from UK, ₹95 lakh (US$140,000) from Australia, ₹44 lakh (US$65,000) from New Zealand and ₹3 lakh (US$4,500) from Malaysia.^[26]

Soundtrack

Shivaay's soundtrack is composed by Mithoon with guest vocal appearance by the British Pop-rock band The Vamps, while the lyrics been penned by Sayeed Quadri & Sandeep Shrivastava.^[28] On 11 September 2016 the title track of Shivaay titled Bolo Har Har Har was released, which was sung by Mithoon, Mohit Chauhan, Sukhwinder Singh, Badshah, Megha Sriram Dalton, Anugrah.^[29][30] The second song, "Darkhaast", was released on 22 September 2016, and featured vocals by Arijit Singh and Sunidhi Chauhan.^[31] All the music rights of Shivaay are acquired by T-Series.

Track listing

References

External links

• Shivaay at the Internet Movie Database
• Shivaay on Facebook
• Shivaay on Twitter