The Guardian review

Eklavya - The Royal Guard
***

Peter BradshawFriday February 16, 2007The Guardian

Here's a robustly unassuming and entertaining Bollywood melodrama starring Amitabh Bachchan and Sanjay Dutt, set in a romanticised contemporary Rajasthan. It begins with a quotation from Shakespeare - thus underlining an interestingly persistent resemblance between the contemporary Bollywood genre and idioms of popular English drama from Shakespeare's day: kings, queens, fantasy, intrigue and romance.
Bachchan plays the decent, loyal manservant and royal guard to one of the Ruritanian "kings" of modern Rajasthan; he stumbles upon court plotting and soap opera-ish parentage secrets; there are terrible truths to uncover and revenges to carry out. Director Vidhu Vinod Chopra puts it over with some panache.