The success of URI, the 2019 Adithya Dhar movie starring Vicky Kaushal, had made way for many hyper-nationalistic movies that initially tasted success. But eventually, they all faced rejection from the audience as they realized that the makers were just milking the sentiments. When I saw the trailer of the latest Akshay Kumar starrer, Sky Force, which had dialogues like “tera baap Hindustan” and “this madness is called patriotism” along with the ridiculously bad CGI, my expectations became really low about this film as I was expecting yet another jingoistic film. But because of the trashiness of the numerous hate-mongering films that got released in the last 6 years, the groundedness of the second half of Sky Force really surprises you, and it is almost like watching a patchy Balayya movie that sort of respects gravity. I mean, you wouldn’t expect that.
So, the story here is happening over a span of almost two decades, starting from 1965 to 1988. In ’65, Wing Commander Kumar Om Ahuja and his team, which included TK Vijaya aka Tabby, carried out an airstrike mission against Pakistan after they attacked the Indian airbase and killed our soldiers. Even though the team succeeded in that mission, it came at the cost of losing Tabby, who was a backup pilot. With Tabby being in that “missing in action” status, it was difficult for Ahuja, who considered him as his brother, to face Tabby’s wife. What we see in this fictionalized account is Ahuja’s efforts to find out what really happened to TK Vijaya.
So, the movie is a cinematically visualized version of what happened to Squadron Leader Ajjamada Boppayya Devayya. The first half of the film is something that you expect from the current Bollywood. If you were also disappointed seeing the loud Pakistan Murdabad trailer, the first half will be a test of patience for you as the movie looks really shallow in terms of craft and the way scenes are written. When it comes to the second half of the film, “Josh” is not that high, and we can see Ahuja being a realistic soldier who goes through proper channels to make sure his brother gets a proper acknowledgment from the IAF for what he did. This segment of the movie has two soldiers from both countries acting like two genuine human beings, which is a rarity in the current Bollywood war movie template.
The film, directed by Sandeep Kewlani and Abhishek Anil Kapur, feels like a movie that is slightly confused about how to treat the subject. Niren Bhatt, who is now the main writer in Maddock’s horror comedy universe, is one of the co-writers of this movie. Somewhere in the second half, it almost feels like the makers suddenly realize that this kind of treatment is no longer going to work, and the movie shape shifts immediately. The dialogues, even in the second half, are pretty loud, and they are still underestimating the ability of the viewer to understand stuff from whatever is shared with them. The bumper sticker patriotic dialogues are falling flat, and the CGI, which has a game-like glossy texture, just doesn’t have the realness you would expect. And to make it worse, the over-the-top imagination of setpieces makes it a visual chapter that you just sit through. The thumping background score from Justin Varghese in key moments in the climax actually helps the movie elevate the emotional quotient.
Since the movie is spread over more than two decades, the decision to cast someone in Akshay Kumar’s age bracket made sense, and the performance never looked like a teleprompter-supported one. The usual acrobatics was there from the star. Debutant Veer Pahariya, who looks like a no-brainer choice if someone has plans to do a Virat Kohli biopic, is playing this disobedient, over-enthusiastic character in the most old-school manner. There was no power in the way he delivered his lines. When the credits happened in the beginning, it was shown that Nimrat Kaur’s part was a “Special Appearance.” But when you look at the movie, she has more footage than Sara Ali Khan, who played the part of Tabby’s wife. The Bollywood stereotype of assuming that a South Indian woman would even go to a party with jasmine flowers on her hair is a sad sight to see.
I wouldn’t say Sky Force is a great film. It is a flawed film that is striving to be a gallery pleaser. But if you can make a list of things that Bollywood needs to change in order to bounce back, one of the points would be to be a less hate-mongering tool of certain political ideologies. The detour this film took from a predicted Pakistan bashing formula is something that I would like to see as a beginning of the Hindi film industry understanding its flaws.
The detour this film took from a predicted Pakistan bashing formula is something that I would like to see as a beginning of the Hindi film industry understanding its flaws.
Green: Recommended Content
Orange: The In-Between Ones
Red: Not Recommended