Film Review: Yodha [Warrior]

Starring: Sidharth Malhotra, Disha Patani, Raashii Khanna, Tanuj Virwani, Ankit Raj, Kumpal Patel, Amit Singh Thakur

Directors: Sagar Ambre & Pudhkar Ojha

A Dharma Productions film comes pre-packaged with breath-taking locales, melodious tunes and slick shots already factored in and this action thriller is no exception.

Arun Katyal (Malhotra) is a daredevil soldier within one of India’s elite undercover units, made up of the finest warriors from the Army, Navy and Air Force to make up the Yodha Task Force. After a death-defying display of his skills to rescue a kidnapped boy from some cross-border arms smugglers, Arun firmly establishes his reputation of taking risky matters into his own hands – over and above any orders from the high command.

This careless and insubordinate approach does not impress his wife, Priyamvada Katyal (Khanna), who also happens to be part of that higher chain of command in the Ministry of Defence. When a civilian plane on which Arun is the in-flight security commando protecting a VIP nuclear scientist gets hijacked by terrorists, this clash of views comes into sharp focus. While Arun stakes his own life to protect the scientist under his charge and as many civilians as possible, an unfortunate tragedy stops him in his tracks and sounds the death knell of the Yodha Task Force in the process.

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Given that this high expertise unit had been launched by his own hero, his late father, and that he had dedicated his life to its mission, Arun finds himself floundering without a clear goal in life. His conviction that the system failed the fearless warriors leads him to campaign against the dilution of the task force, with his mental health and personal life taking a beating in the process. Will Arun manage to revive the Yodha spirit in time for a crucial India-Pakistan peace summit to rescue the talks?

Anyone familiar with this genre will know that answer well. There are no surprises packed in there, except a few twists along the way during two very gripping hijack dramas. Where the film makes a welcome departure from other patriotic thrillers is to very explicitly cast the terrorists as the enemies of peace, rather than turn an entire nation into a villain.

The script flows well and the performances are impressive, especially Malhotra as the intrepid Yodha. If the idea was to have a Bollywood version of Tom Cruise in ‘Top Gun’, he isn’t far off that mark.

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‘Yodha’ offers quite an enjoyable ride with some catchy one-liners from iconic Dharma films thrown in for comic relief and a very timely “I am the hero of this film” refrain from the lead actor during a power-packed climax. Sidharth Malhotra most certainly is!