Movie: Fighter
U/A: Action, thriller
Dir: Siddharth Anand
Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Deepika Padukone, Anil Kapoor
Rating: 2.5/5

A line from a song in Fighter goes, Zameen walon ko samajh nahi aani, meri Heer aasmani (People on the ground will not understand my love for the sky), which underlines the film’s theme about a group of Indian Air Force officers’ transcendental love for the nation. However, it seems to convey the opposite. Instead, it succinctly articulates how one feels after watching this patriotic, laced with jingoistic provocations, outing. You do understand their love, but not feel it.

Exactly a year ago, on January 25, director Siddharth Anand brought to the screens a rousing action drama—Pathaan—that appeared as a timely reclamation of patriotism from the hyper-nationalistic sentiment that has engulfed the country. It was about a bruised but not beaten soldier returning to duty to fight an ex-army man whose lover, his nation, had betrayed him. The expectations from the director, who has a record of earning more than  R1,000 crore globally, combined with Hrithik Roshan and Deepika Padukone’s star power, a reliable ensemble, and, of course, the spectacular treatment of the action genre that he has now mastered, were naturally high when he returned with another dose of ‘save the nation’. But the result isn’t even half as stirring. Fighter is shiny throughout, with ample beauty to marvel at in the form of its lead stars as well as the skies they conquer. Roshan brings his inherent gorgeousness, and to his credit, he fills this mannequin exterior with vulnerability and drama to the best of his abilities. Sadly, he does more for the film than it does for him. The screenplay by Ramon Chibb, who co-wrote the story with Anand, fails to amplify the drama needed to ground a film, which relies heavily on fight and flight.