Airlift **
Dir: Raja Menon.
With: Akshay Kumar, Nimrat Kaur, Feryna Wazheir, Inaamulhaq. 130 mins. Cert:
12A
In August 1990, an
estimated 170,000 Indians were stranded in no-man’s-land after Iraqi tanks
rolled into their adopted home of Kuwait. Frantic backroom negotiations
followed between the Indian and Iraqi authorities; eventually, 488 Air India
flights were cleared to leave for Bombay from neighbouring Jordan. To this day,
the action remains the biggest civilian evacuation in aviation history, and a
source of great – if underreported – pride to the parties involved. New movie Airlift, however, simplifies this
incredibly complex operation to become little more than a vehicle for one man’s
redemption.
That man is Ranjit
Katyal (Akshay Kumar), fictional composite of several businessmen then
operating in the Gulf. Early scenes in Raja Menon’s film go out of their way to
ensure even the most dunderheaded of multiplex nacho-guzzlers will understand
just what a wretch he is. He ignores his wife’s pleas not to drink too much; he
upbraids his driver for listening to backward Bollywood hits. We get the idea
pretty quickly: Ranjit is the picture of the bad Indian who’s forsaken his homeland
in pursuit of bigger bucks – a sharp-suited mercenary who needs shaking from
his complacency.
He will be, and the
writers sound their cleverest note as the Iraqis invade. Generally keen to
self-identify as a forward-thinking Kuwaiti – the pal of princes, a chum to
CEOs – Ranjit is only too quick to wave his Indian passport, and thus claim
immunity, when the invaders threaten his upward mobility. As this retelling has
it, seeing their underlings shot was just the jolt callous penny-pinchers like
Ranjit needed to redirect their resources towards getting their countrymen
home. Yet while Menon has time to finesse this transition – for two hours,
we’re watching characters getting nowhere by boat and bus – it’s never remotely
convincing.
As such, Airlift continues its leading man’s
topsy-turvy year. Kumar gave his most mature performance yet in a film nobody
much cared for (August’s Brothers)
before reverting to gurning, crowdpleasing type for October’s Singh is Bliing. With his
salt-and-pepper stubble, he lends Ranjit undeniable authority – if he can
resist the lure of franchise cinema, he’ll someday give a great performance in
a worthwhile film – but he’s ill-served by this flimsy material. “I don’t want
to be the Messiah,” Ranjit insists, but the film absolutely wants him to be,
which renders Kumar’s subtler responses moot: Ranjit’s arc was settled long
before the actor stepped into shot.
The sanctification
process reduces Ranjit’s wife (Nimrat Kaur, so affecting in 2013’s The Lunchbox) to a terrible bore,
forever lecturing non-believers as to her husband’s virtue. Worse, it
necessitates demonising all those who would clip Ranjit’s wings. The more
depraved Airlift makes its Iraqis –
having them hang folk from cranes, grope young women, even slit a teddy bear’s
belly – the phonier it gets as drama: you wonder why Menon didn’t go the whole
hog and give them little green antennae and ray guns. As it is, the soldiers
provide blessed relief, marching into every other scene and thereby breaking up
the pious speechifying.
It’s possible this
episode was, above anything else, a logistical triumph: accounts suggest the
Indian and Iraqi delegations enjoyed cordial relations, which made the airlift
easier to facilitate. Menon pulls some of it off: he reproduces that dusty look
now de rigueur for Middle East movies, repositions his extras efficiently, and
finally allows the Indian flag to be raised again. Yet the warm wads of
dramatic dung tossed into this sandstorm prove wholly resistible. Airlift transports its characters the
2500 miles back to their promised land, as history demands, but I wouldn’t
trust its underlying nationalism as far as I could throw it.
Airlift is now playing in cinemas nationwide.
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