WAR Review: A Monotonous Action-Thriller!

Fast cars, a charismatic male lead, grandiose action set-pieces and a sky-high budget, Yash Raj Films might have stumbled upon an identical stepbrother for it’s Dhoom franchise in WAR. Starring the two men who beyond a doubt followed a strict diet during the entire shooting process, WAR directed by Siddharth Anand is an action-thriller with a heavy emphasis on the word “Action.”

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The storyline of WAR follows an experienced Indian Soldier – Kabir Anand (Hrithik Roshan) who decides to go rogue and does things that his agency requests him not to do. To combat the utter chaos and the reasoning behind the betrayal, the government appoints Khalid (Tiger Shroff) – a former student of Kabir’s who goes on an elongated quest to capture his teacher. The remainder of the storyline focuses on Kabir’s and Khalid’s journeys until they square off in an unanticipated situation.

With a storyline which is predictable for the most part, the real problem of WAR is with its screenplay. Neglecting all the ground rules of telling a great story, writers Shridhar Raghavan and Siddharth Anand focus more on throwing in an action scene into the mix for every ten minutes. Which resulted in a narrative which doesn’t flow and a film that moves without a precise throughline.

Everything felt very uneven, and the conventional way of showcasing most of the scenes in the film did not help either. Be it the protagonists walking across the frame in slow motion, travelling through air (in slow motion) to land a punch or a flying kick, the entire thing felt so uncreative and bland.

Furthermore, on the traditional side of things, the movie also lacked a compelling villain who is capable enough to match the protagonist’s stature. Following the old Indian movie trope, they end up as a comic relief who are intelligent enough to start a war, but, not so good when it comes to ending a fight conclusively. Subsequently, the dull-witted illogical and inexplicable scenes also don’t make any sense whatsoever and often question your intelligence during the 156-minute runtime.

However, all complaints aside, the action sequences minus the logic and the superhuman abilities were pretty solid all across the board. The remarkably choreographed fight sequences were believable as I did not any guys flying across the room when Tiger wallopped with a heavy right hand. Most of them followed consistency by looking good on-screen as I didn’t cringe as much as I do for a Bhai movie.

Production-wise YRF did a lot of spending with this project as I eventually lost count of all the location they covered within those three hours. Also, the music by Vishal and Shekhar and the background score by Sanchit and Ankit Balhara were ordinary and failed to create a much-needed impact.

Penultimately, on to the performances. Hrithik Roshan who is hot off the success of his commercially successful entertainer, Super 30, is back playing the cool cat we all know and love. His charisma, body language, stature and physique supplement to his antihero role splendidly, and he does a great job appealing to the viewer through his magnetic screen presence. Tiger Shroff, on the other hand, was decent at best, and at this point, we should stop expecting something apart from his monotonous performance. His chemistry with Hrithik worked delightfully on the silver screen, and I wouldn’t mind watching them together in a movie miles better than this.

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To sum it up, WAR is a high-budget, high-octane action-thriller which dropped the ball as far as decent storytelling goes. It is bombarded with action scenes every ten minutes which sabotaged the narrative, and the final product is underwhelming as a whole. However, if you’re a sucker of mindless fight sequences or an admirer of either Hrithik or Tiger, go watch this movie or wait until it debuts on Amazon Prime.

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