It is a season for movies inspired by real life events, it is also time to celebrate our 75th Independence day thus you see movies with patriotic themes, just the other day it was Shershah and now Bhuj The Pride of India. It is the story of valour of our unsung heroes of the 1971 war with Pakistan, the war which gave birth to a new nation namely Bangladesh.
Streaming on Disney Hotstar Bhuj The Pride of India is about the tactical Pakistani attack on the western front of India to neutralize advance of Indian army into what was known as East Pakistan. This movie depicts the all out attack by the then Pak President Yahya Khan and his plot to snatch away some regions from India in our western borders abutting Pak mainly on Kutch region of Gujarat, which would then help him in negotiating with the Indian P.M. at the time i.e. Indira Gandhi.
As mentioned they were tactical attacks, as it is well known that Pak army is great at tactical planning but they always do a major goof up in their stretegic or long term military planning and come out looking foolish and lost.
Though Bhuj The Pride of India starts off well with aerial attack on Jamnagar and Bhuj and other Indian Airforce bases along the western borders, as they were the primary bases which could provide staunch defense and aid to our army on the western front, but there is confusion while establishing the lead cast and the main characters of the time as within the first 15-20 minutes the movie moves forward and backward in a short span of 3-4 days.
Some cinematic liberties are taken to keep the narrative interesting but theis the screenplay is weak. There is no doubt the the movie does bring out sentiments of patriotism within you but a few things shown do smack of bravardo. There are some weak points, like the band of guys shown are only these people engaged in the whole battle plan, do seniors in the army leave the post commanders to their own instruments in face of adversity.
Time and again a high ranking officer asking why is his chief subordinate feeling sad, looks repeatitive and odd as if there is a paucity of dialogues or an urgent need to fill gaps. Sanjay Dutt as Pagi is omnipresent and a pale shadow of his old self. Sharad Kelkar tries hard to put some punch in his role but fails, Sonakshi Sinha had too minuscule a role to talk too much about.
It leaves only Ajay Devgan to shoulder the major responsibility after all it is his home production, he does well and under plays his role. There is a lot of bombing and destruction being a war based movie and they are picturised well, would have definitely looked better on the big screen.
Bhuj The Pride of India, the movie had good intentions but lacked punch however it appears that the movie is more for the theatres and would be enjoyed more in there rather then on your palm staring at a six inch screen.
– Review by PAWAN GUPTA
Cast of Bhuj The Pride of India:
Ajay Devgn as Squadron Leader Vijay Karnik
Sanjay Dutt as Indian Army Scout Ranchordas Pagi
Sonakshi Sinha as Sunderben Jetha Madharparya
Nora Fatehi as Spy Heena Rehman
Sharad Kelkar as Military Officer Ram Karan “RK” Nair
Ammy Virk as Flight Lieutenant Vikram Singh Baj Jethaaz
Pranitha Subhash as Usha Karnik
Ihana Dhillon as Nimrat Kaur
Mahesh Shetty as Vinod Karnik
Navni Parihar as Indira Gandhi
Credits of Bhuj The Pride of India:
Directed by Abhishek Dudhaiya
Written by Abhishek Dudhaiya, Raman Kumar, Ritesh Shah, Pooja Bhavoria
Produced by Bhushan Kumar, Ginny Khanuja, Krishan Kumar, Kumar Mangat Pathak, Bunny Sanghavi, Vajir Singh, Abhishek Dudhaiya
Cinematography Aseem Bajaj
Edited by Dharmendra Sharma
Music by Amar Mohile
Production companies – T-Series, Ajay Devgn FFilms, Select Media Holdings LLP
Distributed by Disney+Hotstar
Running time – 113 minutes