Vijay 69 Movie Review: More Ageist Than It Aims to Be
Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
“When the trailer for Vijay 69 was released on Netflix’s YouTube channel, I remember my first thought being, ‘Why can’t Anupam Kher play his own age, and why have they made him look so much older?’ I assumed Anupam Kher was probably over 70, but he was 69 in real life, at the time of the movie’s release, yet seemed so much older. The creators didn’t need to slap make-up and a fake wig on Anupam for the role at all! Our grandfather is 84, and he doesn’t look as old or dowdy as Kher’s character in Vijay 69. Anyway…
Directed by Akshay Roy, who’s co-written the story with Abbas Tyrewala, Anupam Kher plays retired swimming coach Vijay Mathew, who decides to participate in a triathlon to become India’s oldest man to complete one at 69. Vijay makes this resolution after an existential crisis makes him want to achieve something significant before death. Chunky Pandey plays Vijay’s best-friend Fali, a Parsi doctor, who ostentatiously laughs at Vijay’s new dream. And everybody else, from Vijay’s cynical daughter (Sulagna Panigrahi) to his over-friendly neighbour (Guddi Maruti), have the same reaction. Will Vijay get to participate and finish the triathlon? That’s pretty much the story.
Despite its interesting premise, Vijay 69 tries too hard to be funny, and one of the most irritating aspects of the film is Chunky Pandey’s exaggerated portrayal of the eccentric Parsi doctor, Fali. If the creators had simply made Chunky a typical nutty North Indian doctor in his 60s, it could have been much funnier. Vijay and Fali’s friendship is certainly amusing in some scenes, but the gratingly over-the-top Parsi accent forced on Chunky by the directors is far too distracting. Or they should’ve just cast a Parsi actor in the role and maybe then it wouldn’t feel so irksome. Anupam Kher on the other hand as Vijay, a potty-mouthed oldie (he is very generous with the ‘c’ word, the Hindi one), with anger issues, is adequately convincing, however, there’s something so cosmetically sentimental about the script… that it makes Vijay 69 more cringe-y than inspirational.
A major sub-plot in Vijay 69 is about how an 18-year-old boy called Aditya, played by Mihir Ahuja (‘Feels Like Home’/’The Archies’), is also aiming to participate in the triathlon and become the youngest Indian to do so. Aditya’s father gets extremely jealous with the media attention Vijay gets for being a 69-year-old aspiring triathlete, so he attempts to scuttle his chances. Thankfully, a cutesy friendship is formed between the older man & Mihir Ahuja’s character, so the two cheer each other on. I was hoping for the friendship, and was glad the film took that turn. However, the media circus around Vijay’s participation is far too farcical, and didn’t need the kind of space it gets in the film. And to stretch the story over its 2-hour runtime, the writers also put in another sobby sub-plot about Vijay wanting to dedicate his triathlon attempt to his late wife, who passed away due to cancer.
The film made me think of my grandfather more than once, who is easily one of the fittest members of the family; he wakes up and does over an hour of yoga, then walks more than 8,000 steps every day. Every single day. If he decided to take part in a triathlon, there would certainly be some debates at home, but no one in the family would laugh at the idea or think he was crazy—and we’re all from a second-tier city, not savvy Mumbaikars like those in the world of Vijay 69, which tries to be an age-positive movie but ends up being annoyingly ageist in parts. This could’ve been so much more breezy, comedic, and heartwarming, but in its current state, it’s at best a decent one-time watch if you’re looking for a family entertainer and don’t mind some 90s style melodrama.
Rating: 2.5 stars on 5. Stream Vijay 69 on Netflix.
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