The Netflix documentary The Roshans resembles an underwhelmingly written and edited draft of a long manuscript. It does not have any punctuation, leaving the audience’s imagination little room to breathe. It tells and shows you everything, often more than necessary. Take the moment where Rakesh Roshan talks about his struggles as an actor, for instance. We already know that Rakesh is a successful director, without any flops in his filmography. When Rakesh himself talks about his desire to become a director after failures in acting and production, it is obvious that the failures would precipitate his success. But then his son Hrithik Roshan reiterates this point with the most basic line, “Through those failures, he became what he was truly meant to be.”
Streamer: Netflix
Subjects: Roshan, Rakesh Roshan, Rajesh Roshan, Hrithik Roshan
The Roshansdespite its noble intentions, suffers from a repetitive structure that makes it feel longer than it is. In the documentary, speakers often reiterate an idea about the family’s creative prowess or long legacy. For instance, one speaker emphasises one of the Roshans’ brilliance, only for another to immediately echo the sentiment, seemingly intent on overstating their genius. The platitude with which most of the speakers describe the Roshans makes the documentary rather uninteresting, notwithstanding the sheer passion that has gone into every single moment here. In one moment, Rajesh Roshan is described as a ‘very creative person’. The moment comes midway through the section devoted to Rajesh. Of course, he is a music director with a diverse body of work and many successful collaborations. What else could he possibly be, given his profession? In another moment, someone describes Hrithik Roshan as a ‘Greek God’. It then leads to an entire section that simply gloats over Hrithik’s skills as a dancer. It does not take much for us to wonder what is the point of stating the obvious. It feels almost like cricket commentary.
Even when the documentary tries to explore a seemingly interesting facet about one of the Roshans, it does not pique our curiosity enough because we already know it. For example, the portion about Hrithik acting as a young boy in a scene with Rajinikanth or a gangster attack on Rakesh Roshan. It does not take much online research to get these facts.
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