Divya Khossla does not have the magnetism to carry a film by herself.
If it weren’t for Anil Kapoor playing his part with far more gusto than required, Savi would have been tough to sit through, points out Deepa Gahlot.

The Paul Haggis film, The Next Three Days (2010) on which Savi is based, had Russell Crowe playing an ordinary man who does everything he can to spring his innocent wife out of prison, where she is serving life for murder. Abhinay Deo turns the protagonist into a woman, so that the plot can be given that modern-day Savitri-Satyavan interpretation.

In his considerably simplified version, Savi (Divya Khossla) lives in London with her husband Nakul (Harshvardhan Rane) and young son. Their lives are upended when he is arrested and quickly convicted for a murder he did not commit. (In India, the case would have gone on for years!)

When Nakul is badly beaten up by other inmates, Savi decides that she will spring him out of a maximum security prison. For this she Googles ‘prison break’ and then reads dozens of books on jail escapes in the library. All of which is unintentionally funny.

She finally zeroes in on an Indian writer, J Paul (Anil Kapoor), who has escaped from prison seven times, and written books (on an old-fashioned typewriter) about his methods.

He lives like a recluse in a palatial mansion on a huge estate, but Savi gets through his defences and he agrees to help her.

Anil Kapoor inexplicably agreed to do this film, so his role is extended, and he gets to wear bizarre disguises and land up for split second rescues, because even though the tagline of the film is ‘a bloody housewife’, a woman does need a lot of help, when she lacks common sense.

Also, in London, apparently, one just has to go to a seedy area and ask the first drug peddler who approaches the car, where forged papers would be available, and then say the magic mug-me words, “I have the money.”

Paul tells her that there is no prison that cannot be broken out of, all it needs is focus and an attention to detail.

In movies, of course, it is always easy. People step out of the way and let the lead character do their thing.

When phone lines are cut, nobody thinks to use their cell phones to communicate.

When the cops, who are otherwise rushing about yelling, things like ‘Guard all exits!’, ‘Seal the city!’ — like they were chasing dangerous terrorists — get into their cars to go to the airport from where Savi is supposedly flying out with fake passports, instead of phoning and halting the flight.

The London cops underestimate Savi’s smarts, because they dismiss her as just a housewife.

Also, they don’t know she read all those books and has an expert on jailbreaks having her back.

Because Savi and Nakul have very little time together, there are flashbacks to their romance, and a needless backstory of Savi having survived riots in the past, which somehow explains her resilience.

It doesn’t explain why she wears the same wide-eyed, slightly baffled expression all the time.

Divya Khossla does not have the magnetism to carry a film by herself. If it weren’t for Anil Kapoor playing his part with far more gusto than required, Savi would have been tough to sit through, despite the brisk two-hour running time.

Savi Review Rediff Rating: