The following things about this movie left a sour taste in my mouth.

1-Black and White characters, literally. All Goras and Phirangees are depicted as super villains. It’s one thing to caricature Hitler and the Nazis. But, how fair is to depict the British hockey team as vile conspirators for just wanting to compete against India. It’s an Olympic event, and there can be only one Gold winner. A true sportsprrson always treats his/her competitors with dignity and respect. To do otherwise is to depict all Indian sportspersons in a poor light. Imagine a Gora watching this jingoistic nonsense, what kind of opinion he/she will form of Indians. That we are all basically sore losers that lack impartiality and sportsmanship.

2. For a historical movie, facts aren’t too important to Akshay Kumar. I had been expecting to see characters portraying Dhyan Chand and Roop Chand. Who the hell is “Samrat”? You simply cannot make a movie about 1936 Berlin Olympics without these Indian hockey legends. Poetic license is well and good but not when you brazenly omit the mentions of Indian hockey wizards who had forced Hitler to abandon his Aryan supremacy theory, if for a fleeting moment. I’m assuming that Dhyan Chand’s present day descendants did not give Akshay Kumar the permission to tinker with their family icon’s image, considering he is known more for spinning out lowbrow trash, such as Rowdy Rathore. Had Akshay Kumar consulted a serious filmmaker, it would still have been possible to depict Dhyan Chand’s character at a distance, while speeding through the 1936 Berlin scenes in flashbacks or montage shots. Inventing a character like Samrat to replace Dhyan Chand is an unforgivable crime in my book.

3- All Bengalis should come together and bash up Akshay Kumar. As a Bengali, it was difficult for me to sit through three hours of Akshay Kumar portraying us as town drunkards, bordering on lowest order scumbags. But I understand that you will find a few Bengali drunkards just as in every other community. Mocking the Bengali accent is OK in my book, even though I haven’t seen anyone say “Durga Durga” every 5 seconds. A little bit of good hearted mockery isn’t bad, had Akshay Kumar gone easy on the drunken fool character, all else would have been forgiven. Only saving grace, Mouni Roy’s character was spot on as a nit-picking, domineering Bengali wife.

The only reason Akshay Kumar’s Baby was worth was because of three talented Pakistani actors. For some reason, Akshay does have a soft corner for the Pakistanis which was carried over into this movie as well, a heartwarming scene being all the Pakistani players cheering on the Indian team in the finals.

It might be acceptable to make this moron an ambassador for India-Pakistan peace process but Akshay Kumar should never make a serious movie again. Like Rahul Gandhi, he can’t disguise his silly grin in sad occasions for even 5 seconds. I’m tired of watching him play happy go lucky characters thinking that can provide an excuse for imbecilic mediocrity.