After War and Pathaan, filmmaker Siddharth Anand comes up with another full-on action film that feeds on the same theme of the Indian fauj taking on terrorists from the other side of the border. And what a time to release the film – The Republic Day weekend when already Nationalistic fervour is on a high everywhere in the country. Siddharth more or less hits the bulls-eye on this one, having got the mix right in terms of mass elements, emotion, some story and the star cast.
If the 2019 film – Uri: The Surgical Strike was based on the militant attack on Uri base and the subsequent across the LOC surgical strike by Indian forces, Fighter is inspired by India’s air strike on Balakot, Pakistan in the aftermath of the Pulwama attack on CRPF by Pak militants. The story arc of the film is therefore quite predictable with an Action – Reaction – Counter Action – Extreme Reaction template. The story revolves around a crack special Airforce team that is tasked with carrying out the retaliatory strikes.
The character arc of every member of the team is predictable. If there is one thing that bogs down the film time and again is its sticking to cliches and stereotypes – whether it is characters, the portrayal of the Indian faujis and the ecosystem, the hierarchical tussles within the force, the evil characterisation of the villains in Pakistan, the sketching of Pakistani generals as jokers, the massy dialogues of the chest-thumping type, the Sujalam Sufalam background score – I can go on and on. The film doesn’t move even an inch away from the “Golden standard of Bollywood stereotyping”!
Yet, the film is saved to a large extent by its casting and elevated significantly by the making and Director Siddharth Anand deserves huge credit for the same. I will come to the action sequences and their making in a bit. Before that, the staging of some of the emotional scenes like the last rites of one of the members of the Airforce team is immaculately done with a fine mix of imagery, poignancy and accuracy. There are more such scenes that Sidhharth and team manage to get them right.
Coming to the action scenes, one could say that they are highly inspired by Hollywood films of the same genre. But then which filmmaker in India is not inspired by Hollywood? So, keeping that cliché aside, I must say that the action choreography which is largely involving military aircrafts is very well done. There is a lot of work that has gone here on the SFX and VFX front which makes the sequences pacy and largely real.
Teaming up with Siddharth after War, Hritik is in his element in the film with his sheer screen presence. His well-chiselled physique and geometrically perfect jawlines show the kind of hard work he has put in for the film. He looks lean and mean in a character that closely resembles that of Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara. But, the one actor who I was impressed with the most was Anil Kapoor. As the leader of this special air force team, he looks fitter and agile than most of his junior team members! Deepika is there in the film to bring in a gender balance in the team but beyond taking part in cliched moments and a back story, she doesn’t get too much play. As a fighter pilot, she looks the part but deserves a better pie in the film. Rishabh Sawhney as Azhar Akhtar, the Pakistani villain tries hard on his debut but is bogged down by run-of-the-mill sketching of his character.
In line with the current trend of whipping up excessive Nationalistic fervour in films, Siddharth too plays to the gallery with some seeti maar, Over the top dialogues making a Sunny Deol out of Hrithik Roshan like – “POK ka matlab – Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, par Maalik hum hai” and “Jaldi hi – Pakistan IOP (Indian Occupied Pakistan) ho jayega”! The excessive stereotyping treatment gets to you in the film and soon one will get tired of this genre of Action – Reaction involving Pakistani/Jihadi terrorists. Incidentally, I couldn’t get past even the first episode of Indian Police Force, a new series in the same genre now streaming as a web series, for the same reason.
Fighter is good in parts and is watchable, particularly for the making of the action sequences in the second half and Hritik Roshan. All said and done, the film manages to invoke a patriotic sense and respect towards the “armed forces” by the end. The Director in that sense has achieved his purpose.
AnandKumarRSonFilms 
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