Bhaag Milkha Bhaag

Well, the movie literally has every element that needs to be there in an inspirational drama. The real beauty of the film lies in those moments where you realize that these are incidents that occurred in the life of India’s greatest athlete. Director Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s latest venture “ Bhaag Milkha Bhaag ” is a brilliant piece of cinema that will definitely have that emotional impact on you.

The movie opens with Milkha Singh’s performance in the final round of the Rome Olympics. After the defeat he was totally down and also decides not to attend the friendly athletic meet in Pakisthan. The confused authorities are persuading him to make himself available for the big event. The movie is a narration about the life of Milkha through the eyes of his military level coach Gurudev Singh. The bitter childhood, the romantic young age, the fight to become the fastest and also how he won over that dark incident in the past which kept on pulling him backward is what Bhaag Milkha Bhaag basically about.

The movie has a running time of over 3 hours and surprisingly the film isn’t a tiring experience. The amount of melodrama can annoy some percentage of audience but I found it quiet sensible as the kind of struggle he had demanded that level of drama. By involving those two romantic angles, Prasoon Joshi didn’t tried to make it too much of a commercial flavor, but instead he placed those emotions in molding the more focused athlete in Milkha Singh. The love of Milkha for his sister was something touching. They have smartly used the Indo-Pak relation in the script as it had an important space in Milkha Singh’s global recognition. The climax that showed Milkha’s “Flying Sikh” performance also tried to depict the race as a man’s victory over his past.

Hats off to Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra for making this excellent biopic. Very fewer compromises were made in the technical aspects. The script that exposed almost every angle of the great athlete didn’t go to that boasting level. And Mr. Mehra rightly captured the content with striking visuals comprising of slow motions and color tones. That 400 meter race where Milkha runs with the injury and the way the makers showed his determination through that sequence was really a great piece of conceiving. Excellent cinematography from Binod Pradhan. The combined effect of Pradhan’s cinematography, visual effects, color tone and Farhan’s style of running really gave the athletic part in the movie that international standard. Smartly edited film with engaging background scores. Music was also really good. Pat on the back for the visual effects section for recreating the old times.

In the acting part, Farhan Akthar is simply amazing as the central protagonist. The confusion, the anger and the determination was really evident in the rendering and special mention for the physical transformation including the running. Sonam Kapoor doesn’t really have any great screen time. In fact, the slightly dull phase in the movie is that romantic episode involving her. Rebecca Breeds did her part nicely. Two actors who impressed me with their performances were Divya Dutta and Pawan Malhothra as the sister and military coach respectively. Prakash Raj and Yograj Singh also did their part nicely.

Overall, it is a fitting tribute to Milkha Singh from the film industry. Just the fact that this is a story about the struggle of a 12 year old boy from nothing  to India’s best athlete itself makes the movie a delightful experience. I am giving 4/5 and a big salute to Jawan Milkha Singh aka Flying Sikh.