Shahrukh Khan is Bollywood’s King. Not only is he renowned by many people but also has a creditable name publicized very well globally. Similarly, his films are also grand and merit publicity and are generally known and also are one of the most anticipating films of the year. His ‘Fan’ too is a big film. But the impact goes slightly tepid and makes the film an imperfect failure. I went inside the hall admiring a new thing from which I can learn something. But not anything pleases me at all.

Shahrukh khan plays a dual role. On one side he is the leading jutting out Superstar Aryan Khanna. And in the other hand is his biggest fan – Gaurav, who has a great keenness to emote him and also admires him deeply as his all mighty. Like the trailers and the teasers everything in the film remains of a self-same type (especially the foreseeable format of the plot).

Shahrukh delivers an acting performance worth high praises. His makeover as Gaurav is very monumental. And he is fully earnestly appealing.

The film is fabricated under the banner Yash Raj Films. But the director and the makers are losing, fail to enrapture the viewer’s interests creating the film a haywire. Nevertheless, the dialogues are realistic and pleasant. And the film also takes a new spin post intermission. It is an average watch and deserves only 2.5 stars from me.

When you become most anticipated, marketed and hugely expected to be some revolutionary thing, it’s quite tough to satisfy both intellectually and entertainingly. Fan has the most brilliant post-production work for any Bollywood cinema till date in my opinion. It somehow convinces that it can be SRK’s career best till date which is not something that has to be shoved down one’s throat as Shah Rukh Khan can do something magical whenever possible. But living up to this much of hype and excitement is not an easy thing. Brilliantly edited trailer and teaser, all those fan interviews about how Shah Rukh Khan is a ray of hope and inspiration to them, coming up with something fresh and edgy after all those monotonous commercially targeted movies, do all these live up to the buildup?

First things first, Maneesh Sharma is a skilled director. He does whatever could have been done with the script. Let that be creating the perfect vibe between the situation and the screenplay to make the most magical moment on screen, or utilizing the powerhouse of acting talent, his highness, Shah Rukh Khan to the fullest, everything is bang-on. Still, the foreground of how Gaurav became so insanely affectionate of Aryan Khanna fell short of convincibility mostly because of not paying much attention to it. But the idea of his fondness just because of Aryan Khanna’s larger than life stardom was much convincing why his faith towards his favorite actor broke so easily. Especially, brownie points for when his mother realized they should have got Gaurav more focused on Aryan Khanna’s struggle throughout the years, so it would have been a bit hard for him to relate with the star this massively. How Maneesh Sharma played with both the character’s impact on the movie is commendable as it’s a tough call to judge them while the movie is playing.

It’s a simple story of how a 25-year old, Inder Nagar, Delhi resident Gaurav Chanana (Shah Rukh Khan), a doppelganger of superstar Aryan Khanna (Shah Rukh Khan), also happens to be a die-hard fan of the superstar he resembles so much aesthetically. He eats, sleeps and breaths Aryan since childhood and has made him a part of himself throughout these many years. How Gaurav’s destiny is changed when he decides to gift his trophy (won on a local housing society talent show) to his superstar and several incidents later, the biggest fan becomes the biggest nemesis for the superstar is the rest of the story.

Story on obsession, later resulting to enmity is nothing new and has happened several times before, so excellent scripting and exciting out-of-the-box subplots could have made something epic for the viewers to cherish. But sadly, even Habib Faisal fails to impress us by his writing. The scripting is too loose and very faulty at parts which was very disappointing to see at such a hyped movie. With such a brilliant actor who could have carried out anything, scripting could have worked as the gear to make the movie more interesting. Nothing like never-seen-before is there in Fan, and frankly, the actor was trying to jolt the situations for something extraordinary to happen.

The biggest problem with Fan is it shows the symptoms of getting interesting and provocative at certain situations, but the next moment you know, it’s back to stereotyping. The Quick transformation of Gaurav’s sentiment towards Aryan was brilliant at the pre-interval moments, but after interval, it completely tarnishes the thrill it was trying to maintain. *sigh*

Habib Faisal and Sharat Katariya were the brains behind the dialogues and they have failed to come up with anything that can instigate the masses or even try to sound crafty. If you are working behind such a huge and extravaganza movie, these things matter. Camera work by Manu Anand is terribly plenary. It was so uninteresting and primary that cinematography goes totally unnoticed mostly.

Namrata Rao‘s editing could have been much more crisp and brainy. Post-interval after some moments, the movie totally loses focus. Some scenes seem too stretchy after interval, especially unnecessarily long chase sequences and Gaurav’s different moments of taking revenge.

Also, Some things I’ll really like to mention that Aryan Khanna’s security is screened as very dumb and unwanted. It contradicts logic when nation’s biggest superstar going on his own every now and then, here and there and also Gaurav is causing harm or reaching Aryan Khanna whenever he feels convenient. And why is Gaurav suddenly becoming a full duplicate from a doppelganger at certain times when everyone (including Aryan’s wife, building gate security man) is confusing the two of them. That’s not a nice trick to confuse the viewers even and plant a vague idea about how Gaurav is a genius trickster.

Background score by Andrea Guerra is hugely gripping and one of the best elements of this movie. As there are no songs in the movie, the scores had to be engaging and connecting the movie with the viewers for some audible pleasure, it succeeds with flying colors.

Take a bow Shah Rukh Khan, you are the heart, kidney, liver, lungs, brain and everything else to this movie. It takes a lot of bravura to come out of comfort zone and invest in offbeat scripts that require sheer talent. And, Fan was that chance to SRK which he carries out on his shoulders like a pro. As an obsessive and sweetly delusional Gaurav Chanana, he engages the audience with those brilliant facial movements and jolly good nature of talking, behaving. But when Gaurav gets serious he can lose his mind completely which was also fascinating to see. A single character had these many shades and Shah Rukh Khan has brilliantly carried out everything. Even, as a strong, successful, arrogant Aryan Khanna, Shah Rukh does brilliantly, but these superstar features come naturally to him, so was a no big deal for him I guess.

Special mention for that scene at the ending, when Aryan is imagining Gaurav in the huge crowd of his followers on his birthday.

1. Finally, Gaurav is successful in leaving a solid impact on the superstar he always admired and wanted to remain the mind of.

2. Finally, Aryan realizes how correct it is what he said casually at an event about how his fans make him what he his today and Gaurav pointing him that out.

A gem of a scene. Biggest takeaway from the movie.

Others like Deepika Amin as Gaurav’s mother and Yogendra Tiku as Gaurav’s father were first-rate. Shriya Pilgaonkar as Neha, Gaurav’s love-interest and Waluscha De Sousa as Aryan’s wife were quite convenient in the screen spaces they got.

Fan is a big battle inside your head whether to get a bit disgruntled as the film is deeply flawed or to forgive considering how much Shah Rukh Khan has tried not to make it look so ordinary, which it sadly is.

Shah Rukh Khan has expressed almost everything about his stardom in the movie so bravely that you cannot but be impressed. He is shamelessly donning a Six-pack abs T-shirt and dancing to his own item song mocking the hell out of himself. He is unapologetic to dance at weddings for cash even if that’s so demeaning for his public image and also his personal temper. He doesn’t care whomsoever he slapped at some occasion for their misbehavior. It takes a whole lot of guts to be so valiant and impolitely correct publicly. Bravo for that!

But sadly, Fan was always on the shoulder of the protagonist lacking creativity as well as credibility. It’s Shah Rukh Khan, who has not let the movie get out of hand. This particular fact will be hard to understand just because Shah Rukh Khan did so bloody good. Even though, it is a complete failure as a thriller.

The biggest positive from this movie is the acting of Sharukh khan who gave an incredible performance.His performance as the fan called Gaurav is excellent. The idea of the conflict between a Fan and Star was good and this movie entertaining at times. The second half of the movie is a let down and the climax is ridiculous.I liked the idea of a FAN being a creepy-Psychotic guy but i think writers didn't flesh out the dark side of his character properly. The movie loses it's logics in the second half and it becomes redundant becoming a slave to typical bollywood movies with chase sequences which weren't engaging at all. This movie could have been a very good movie if it had concentrated more on it's characters and handling the psychological battle between Fan and a Star. I hated the climax of the movie because it doesn't make any sense and even the run time of the film felt long.Fan could have been a great movie but unfortunately it isn't.