Kandahar Movie Review: A Wasted Opportunity

Warning- Spoiler Alert

Writer-Director Major Ravi shot into prominence with his very first feature filmKeertichakra which came out in 2006. With an Army background and having worked with people likePriyadarshan, Kamal Haasan, Rajkumar Santoshi and Maniratnam, Major Ravi made his intentions clear that he preferred to make films with an Army background, a milieu that he was very familiar with. Keertichakra was a bilingual (the Tamil version Aran was partly dubbed and partly re-shot) and the Malayalam version did fairly well and was noticed. Major Ravi then went on to make a docu-drama styled film- Mission 90 Days based on the Rajiv Gandhi murder investigation. After the setback of his 2nd film Major Ravi revived the character of Major Mahadevan (Mohanalal) from Keertichakra and made his 3rd film – Kurukshetra.

Ever since Kurukshetra came out Major Ravi has been in the news with various stories doing the rounds about his next film- Kandahar, based on the 1999 plane hijacking. Starting with talks of Major Ravi bringing out the magical jodi of Kamal Haasan and Mohanlal, something that Kamal Haasan then subsequently denied ( they eventually acted together in Unnaipol Oruvan ). Later on the film again came into the news when Amitabh Bachchan was mentioned as having signed the film, a fact which then got confirmed. After this there was a mention of Surya having also been brought on board but this then didn’t work out. Finally then the film took off with the major cast comprising of Mohanlal, Amitabh Bachchan and Ganesh Venkatraman.

Produced by Suresh C. Nair (under Zoe Estebe Moviez) and Mohanlal himself (under Pranavam Arts International), there seemed to be a deliberate attempt to showcase grandness about the film. With the trailer of the film getting unveiled, I started having an uneasy feeling about the film. The trailer even bought back the memories of RGV Ki Aag, a movie where AB Sr and Lal ettan had worked together previously, with a disastrous result of course. Nevertheless since I genuinely admire and respect both the actors I still decided to look up to the film. Thanks to the star cast (especially Amitabh Bachchan- Mohanlal combination) the film managed to get a wide distribution. With the release date (16th Dec, 2010) being timed ideally at the start of the Christmas holidays, the film managed an impressive release both inside Kerala and outside the state.

Ok I realize that I am yet to talk about the plot of the film and the reason is that there is hardly much to say in terms of the film’s plot. But still going ahead I’d say that Kandahar is all about Suryanath Sharma (Ganesh Venkatraman), a firebrand youth who lives in Ooty with his father, Lokanath Sharma ( Amitabh Bachchan ) a retired teacher. Surya’s mother (Sumalatha) is no more. Surya is a typical careless youngster and his father is worried about Surya’s future. Major Mahadevan ( Mohanlal )comes across Surya in an unlikely situation and decides to help him join the army. A parallel track shows a Muslim youth (a friend of Surya) who is misled and made to join a terrorist outfit in Afghanistan. Both the tracks converge when the terrorist outfit decides to hijack a plane from India and bring it to Kandahar to demand the release of their leader, who is in prison in India. No prizes for guessing that Major Mahadevan and his team including Surya decide to go on a rescue mission on board the flight.

If I were to analyze the film and look at what worked and what didn’t work then it becomes an extremely difficult task for me. For, I seriously don’t know what actually works in favor of the film. First of all I’d like to mention that Major Ravi has taken the audience (and probably some of the cast and crew also) for a long ride. For a film titled Kandahar and supposed to be based on the 1999 hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight IC 814, you realize that its hardly the last 20 odd minutes or so of the film that is actually dealing with the actual hijacking. And even the way the rescue mission has been narrated will make you either cry with pain or laugh unnecessarily (depending on how you perceive it). The way Major Mahadevan & his team of NSG commandos easily enter the flight and tackle the situation has to be seen to be believed. It makes me wonder how Major Ravi, an army veteran can be so casual about the whole thing.

As for the writing, it’s clearly evident that there was no proper script written in the first place (making me wonder how Amitabh Bachchan and Mohanlal agreed to do this film). Situations take place with a lot of convenience, but nothing comes out of it. For example when you see the parallel tale of Surya going to the Army and his friend joining a terrorist outfit, you think of films like Anjathey by Mysskin where there is a lot of conflict between the friends when their paths cross each other. Here nothing like it happens. In fact Surya’s friend gets killed in an encounter with the NSG Commando’s and all that Surya tells Major Mahadevan is that “I know him, he was my friend”. Surya is shown to be a brash, careless youth and is made to join the Army. This reminds you of Lakshya, but then while the audience could connect to Hrithik Roshan’s character, Surya’s character portrayed by Ganesh Venkatraman comes across as dull and uninspiring.

A lot of characters are present in the film but you seriously wonder why some of them are in the film in the first place. The only character who really comes across as natural and effective is that of the Muslim youth’s widowed mother portrayed effectively by KPAC Lalitha. Regarding Amitabh Bachchan’s presence in the film and the hype about his Malayalam debut, well most of his dialogues are in Hindi and English. The length of his role wasn’t a problem for me since it was known that he has a cameo in the film. But his role is nothing special enough that calls for his requirement. Mohanlal also looks visibly uncomfortable in a lot of scenes and it’s a surprise considering he’s portraying the character of Major Mahadevan for the 3rd time. The much touted scenes between Mohanlal and Amitabh also lack the intensity that could have easily been there if there was an earnest attempt made, again a failure on part of Major Ravi.

Ganesh Venkatraman who actually is the so called hero of the film looks a complete misfit in the role. When his character is that of a cool youth who is supposed to be well versed in Hindi,Malayalam, English and Tamil, why would you dub his voice with someone who speaks Hindi and English with such a bad accent? It comes across as very glaring especially when Ganesh is talking to AB Sr who of course speaks impeccable Hindi and English. The film has 3-4 songs (music by Shamir Tandon), all of them in Hindi but was there a need to have an item number in a discotheque? Which then makes me ask a question to Mohanalal- sir why would you want to produce this film and revive your home banner- Pranavam Arts International with this dud of a film? Pranavam Arts has been noted in the past for making many acclaimed films like His Highness Abdullah, Bharatham, Kamaladalam, Kaalapani, Vanaprastham etc and to come back with a film like this is baffling to say the least.

All in all with stars like Amitabh Bachchan and Mohanlal and a subject like Kandahar hijacking Major Ravi could have gone ahead and delivered a far better movie than what has actually been made. So it’s a terrible loss of opportunity indeed, something that Major Ravi can never undo. For those wanting to see a film on the Kandahar hijacking, films like Zameen by Rohit Shetty ( Ajay Devgn and Abhishek Bachchan ) or even Yeh Dil Aashiqana by Kuku Kohli are far better to watch than this pain of a film. As for Mohanlal and his Pranavam Arts International, its better to re-watch some of their old films than watching this one. A few hours after watching Kandahar I watched His Highness Abdullah once again by co-incidence and slightly felt better

Originally published in PFC- http://passionforcinema.com/kandahar-movie-review-a-wasted-opportunity/