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Genres: Drama, Thriller Censor: UA Duration: 125 min. Studio / Presenter: Mahesh Manjrekar Movies, Gauri Pictures Producers: Dilip Sahebrao Yadav, Siddharth Kewalchand Jain DOP: Karan Rawat Director: Mahesh Manjrekar Cast:  Vikram Gokhale, Satish Alekar, Dilip Prabhavalkar, Shivaji Satam, Ashok Saraf, Suhas Joshi, Bharti Achrekar, Madhura Velankar, Uday Tikekar, Dipti Lele Movie Review by: Ulhas Shirke.

Eight years ago makers of national award winning film ‘Shwas’ had produced their second Marathi film ‘Second Innings’ which was written and directed by Mohan Parab. This film had shown the power of a group of well educated senior citizens, when it comes to taking on the corrupt system. It was a simple theme, but handled very effectively in an action packed thriller. After watching a crime taking place in front of their eyes, a group of well educated senior citizens unite together to take revenge against a criminal turned politician and people involved in shielding him. The latest released Marathi film ‘Me Shivaji Park’ is inspired by the theme of this film.

In ‘Me Shivaji Park’ too, we find the tale of 5 retired friends named Digambar Sawant (Ashok Saraf) , Vikram Rjyadhyaksha( Vikram Gokhale) , Dilip Pradhan( Dilip Prabhavalkar) , Rustum Mistry( Shivaji Satam) , and Satish Joshi( Satish Alekar) . All of them are seen as regular morning walkers at Shivaji Park. They spend the leisure time having humour filled conversations about their families and discussing current affairs. The story of the film unfolds with Satish’s grand daughter( Manjiri Phadnis) dies after falling from the balcony. There are several rumours spread after her accidental death, which prompts Satish and his friends to investigate the matter on their own, by taking the wrong side of the law. And they begin their work to take the revenge. They do succeed in their mission and eliminate a businessman behind the murder of Satish’s grand daughter. But, Dilip Pradhan who is influenced by Ghandhiji’s philosophy disassociates himself from the group, doubting their integrity.

In the meanwhile another mystery behind Digambar’s past life as a honest but suspended Police officer, unfolds through a flashback. And the screenplay of the film takes a turn with the present location of the corrupt politician( Sharad Ponkshe) and his murderer son( Santosh Juvekar) who had trapped Digambar . A Police officer on special duty (Abhijeet Satam) appointed by CM is also on the job and investigates the previous murder case. This time on their mission to take the revenge against the corrupt politician and his son, they face trouble. However, their well wishers comes to their rescue and all is well at the end.

The screenplay of this film and that of previous film ‘Second Innings’ have many similarities. Revenge against a corrupt politician and his associates by a retired judge, a surgeon and their group have striking similarity. Nevertheless, bringing all versatile artistes in Marathi film industry to play the group of senior citizens makes a big difference. And, they have all done their best. Director Mahesh Manjrekar has also done his best to present them in a way to extract the best out of them. There are other artistes like Suhas Joshi, Bharti Achrekar, Madhura Velankar, Uday Tikekar, Dipti Lele and others have also been used well in their limited roles. The only drawback of the film is that it has been overstretched in the second half with same modus operandi used by the group of senior citizens to enter the house of their target and inclusion of a Lavani in the screenplay of the film. Otherwise, it is a well presented film with good cinematography by Karan Rawat.