This is lazy, indifferent filmmaking, and a colossal bore for most of its running time. A video featuring Salman Khan singing the terrific title track at the end is too little too late.

The end of Sooraj Pancholi, Athiya Shetty film brings relief, with Sallu Bhai working the end credits, exuding more star power in two minutes than we’ve seen in two hours. This ‘Hero’ is a zero.

The new Hero is a mess; the new kids are too dull …Nikhil Advani’s Hero remake follows the template of the original, which may not have been the wisest course of action…

Aditya Pancholi has a dialogue in the film which goes like, “Khota hai par apna hai.” This sums up the idea behind presenting Sooraj Pancholi as ‘the’ hero. Yes, I know, I said that in the beginning as well. Then who’s the real hero of this 131-minute film? Salman Khan. Why? Haven’t you heard his soulful number ‘main hoon hero’ yet?

The only reasonably enjoyable moment is in the end credits, when co-producer Salman Khan shows up to sing a song.

Don’t get carried away, though. Even that’s not worth sitting through the rest of it.

Hero rhymes with zero and it’s tempting, for the sake of the headline and because in the first five minutes of the film my hand went lurking about in search of an eject button, to just write off this film as a big, fat zero.

Unsurprisingly, this struggle to fit a modern-day romance in a dated template prompts a patchy, wobbly, bizarre, humourless drama proving an uphill task for two rank newcomers to tackle.

Overall, this Hero is below mediocre fare except for the lead pair’s straightforward performances.

Producer Salman Khan, who is also the singer of the only tolerable track in the film, continues his rather poor innings as a supporter and encourager of new talent in Bollywood. Pancholi and Shetty will hope that they get a second shot at glory. Hero is a debut film that makes Saawariya and Student of the Year seem good movies. That says a lot about the film itself.

Hero is not Kal Ho Na Ho or D-Day, it is a rather faulty film made by the same director. Only half-entertaining, the film is more like a promotional video for Sooraj Pancholi and Athiya Shetty that doesn’t require a solid plot. Nonetheless, for Bollywood buffs this is a decent watch with great music and the typical ‘Hindi cinema’ storyline.

HERO fails the litmus test of rehashing a classic for the Generation Next. It appeals in very small measures and is not an ideal weekend entertainer. If you a die-hard Salman Khan fan, you may want to patronise, else avoid.

apart from launching new ‘stars’ these remakes actually serve no purpose. To begin with, the filmmakers don’t have enough grounds to believe that they will better or even come close matching the original. So if that is the case, why bother in the first place?

Watch ‘Hero’ if you are a huge Salman Khan fan and want to catch his rendition of the title track with the end credits.

If you are planning to watch this movie, I suggest you press CTRL+ALT+DELETE on your desire to do so.

The best thing comes at the end. When you see Salman Khan crooning ‘Main Hoon Hero Tera’. You wish some of that easy charm had rubbed off on the film.

Nikhil Advani is no Subhash Ghai when it comes to handling potboilers. Hero is a botched up film in effort to provide two reasonably good star kids a launch pad.

Hero has a terribly weak script and ridiculously written dialogues. Except for the cinematography and the unwittingly funny end there is precious little we can cheer for. We want the lovers to unite and we want them to make it fast because it is after all an excruciating watch. No wonder inspite of having worked so hard in the gym Sooraj and Athiya fail to charm us. So I’m going to try my best and not be mean to the newcomers. Let’s judge them on their next outing. Till then let us make a pact and forget about Hero. That would be the smart thing to do.

After watching three hours of this torturous film, a thought came to mind. It’s a plea actually. To Salman Khan and all other producers who actually have the power to shape the cinema that reaches us. If you have the resources, filmmaking expertise, and an obvious passion for cinema, why not back good films that take us forward and not a hundred steps behind? Would someone be so kind as to answer this question, please?

The same movie still gets made. New faces, but no value addition to the film, no new stories. So used to expecting the same thing over and over again have we gotten, that we have even stopped getting bored watching them. You shrug, “what else did you expect” and move on.

The Hero that catapulted Jackie Shroff and Meenakshi Sheshadri to instant stardom had songs like Lambi Judai and Tu Mera Hero which can be partly credited, as they’d factor in the success of films then. But the predictable plot featuring a union of partners from disparate conditions: rich and poor, cop and robber, coolie and client, was passable even though over-utilised then. Today, this photocopy with no plot tweaks seems little more than a tired effort.

Nikhil Advani has mostly stuck to the original story with some unimaginative changes that only misfire. Expecting a strong plot and powerful performances in a masala film was asking for too much but Hero fails to deliver even on basic levels.

It challenges the viewer’s intelligence with its incoherent script, poor direction and below par performances.

There are action scenes in the start and towards the end of the film which are unreal and highly dramatic. Sooraj Pancholi and Athiya Shetty’s Hero is strictly meant for all those who have grown up on a diet of Bollywood movies and are fond of those typical romantic love stories.

Bad writing, poor direction and average performances make Hero forgettable.

Unfortunately even as the anticipations and expectations from Nikhil Advani’s ‘Hero’ were very high, it fails to deliver what was expected from it. Frankly, Advani’s ‘Hero’ comes nowhere even close to original ‘Hero’ directed by veteran Subhash Ghai in any department. We are going for two stars for ‘Hero’. Watch it only if you have nothing better to do this weekend and if indeed you have something very special to do, you can easily skip this one.