This has been a first for me. Here
was me sitting through an entire Salman Khan movie without consecutively experiencing
irritation, boredom, disgust and bewilderment and not necessarily in that
order. Much as he is a favorite of Chammak Challo and a rage amongst his millions
of wide eyed fans, his acting skills or rather his choice of roles always left
me unimpressed. Combine that with his reported off screen persona which itself
is a contradiction. A painter, a known charity promoter, darling of numerous
beneficiaries of his generosity, he is also reputed to be a man walking on the
fringes of the law. His supposed indiscretions may or may not be true but the
image that I saw on the screen always came across to be shallow and
unimpressive. The body of a Greek god and gyrations to silly tunes never helped
me form a favorable opinion about his capacity to emote or hold my interest in
his cinematic presence. Ek Tha Tiger changed all of that.
The plot of the story is nothing
new. Bits and pieces have been picked from here and there from a number of
Hollywood spy stories, woven together in a fabric of India-Pakistan’s never
ending conflict of interests and played out across different exotic international
locations. So after the cross nation tour courtesy Agent Vinod, we are taken
from the savage streets of Iraq to the traditional Britain to beautiful Turkey
to hold your breath, the never before Cuba. The photographer in me would have
seen the movie just for the spectacular landscape of these places. The opening
sequence of twenty odd Paki agents who couldn’t shoot straight at thirty feet
and systematically got steam rolled by our home grown James Bond badly aping
the free style running made fashionable by the original had me groaning. Not
again, I said to myself and started getting ready to raid the snack shop. But
hark, normalcy returned quickly. The tiger returns to his lair and is
reassigned to another mission, of observation only as he is reminded, in the
hallowed precincts of some intimidating academic institution in the Queen’s
country. Then boy meets girl, sparks invariably fly, Pakis re enter to spoil
the party which I am not going to do by revealing anything more.
What impressed me the most was
the treatment of the razor thin plot. It’s a judicious mixture of high voltage action,
romance and drama, the classic ingredients of most Bollywood pot boilers but
Kabir Khan got the proportion right. Salman Khan is for once bereft of his meaningless
comical avatar and has acted with remarkable restraint. His action prowess
remains unchanged but he looks the part of the rock solid, caring, protective
and oh so vulnerable romantic lover when the occasion demands. The girls are
going to get ever so moony eyed just over this. Katrina, of course, looks like
a million bucks. The background score is outstanding even though the main theme
sounds suspiciously like King Khan’s Don. Sohali Sen’s choice of western
classical strains of melody tremendously enhanced the depiction of romantic emotions
of the lead pair and mine too. And after a long time it was a pleasure to see
Roshan Seth as the eccentric professor.
The movie is a pleasant departure
from the normal Bollywood action genre which is a great relief from the likes
of head splitting Rowdy Rathore and Bodyguard. The action sequences, although
sometime over the top, are still a visual delight but what really took my
breath away was the cinematography which has lovingly captured the street life
of UK as well as the romantic backdrops of Turkey and Cuba incorporating
everything that the places are famous for. And apart from the initial
buffoonery of the Indo-Paki protagonists it was a great relief to see them
portrayed as competent professionals rather than crazed individuals shooting
jingoistic barbs as each other. Well done Mr Khan, you have redeemed Sallu boy
and I hope he doesn’t remain a one trick pony.
