At times I wonder when will bollywood grow up. When will they start making movies which make some common sense atleast. I agree action movies are suppose to be over the top, but Bollywood takes that meaning to a whole new never been before perceived level. In the same league of extraordinarily disastrous movies is a new entrant – Agnipankh which I happened to see all thanks to UTV movies(the only source of crappy to ultra crappy Hindi movies here in the united states) who claim to have the most amazing list of movies under their banner. The movie includes Jurm, Angaar. Main Chor tu Sipahi...The list to say the least is endless.
Coming back to Agnipankh, its a story about three Air force Pilots namely Jimmy Shergill, Rahul Dev and the third guy and a regenerating Pakistani Army led by the effervescent Ashish Vidyarthi aka Quereshi (I somehow loved this name...the name has a kind of super villainness associated with it). This concept of respawning has been the mainstay of computer games. But the director has awesomely reinvented it to the big screen. Kudos to the guy.
The movie starts off in the air force base in Kashmir, where Jimmy and the third guy are already posted and Rahul is the new entrant. Jimmy is the uber playboy who keeps an album of all his previous girlfriends and who likes to blame everything bad on god. Shamita Shetty is in love with the third guy but the guy think she's a boy...dude its Shamita Shetty for heaven's sake not Amelie Mauresmo...And Rahul Dev is happily married to Divya Dutta, while his friend(Tim Robbins lookalike) still flirts with her and dreams of marrying her....bhai dost ho to aisa...The romantic side being all taken care of, the dushman side is played by a Janitor who as his name goes is a cleaner at the air force base(so that he can overhear all the secret meetings) and also works part time as the leader of some terrorist organization. I have never seen a terrorist organization being so humiliated and disgraced. Pakistan has a plan to attack the air force base and so they want the terrorist to take out the radar installation at the base. However even if the radar attack fails they still want to go ahead with the attack. I tried to decrypt this complex logic but could never come to terms with it. Ultimately I realized the director just wanted to make the movie 30 minutes longer. So as expected the radar attack at the base fails miserably, with the air force pilots showing off their ground combat skills too(Our govt should seriously think of getting rid of the army altogether...we have the air force...we don't need anything else). They manage to kill all the terrorists, but do they manage to diffuse the time bomb which only had about a minute to go off remains a mystery throughout the movie. Air force is good at diffusing the bombs too...we dont need bomb diffusal squads too. Pakistan still goes ahead with the attack. Now its time for India to retaliate. And so goes our Jimmy bhai and the 3rd guy with a trusted sidekick to take out a Pakistani oil base(wtf??) why can't we attack their air force base...Are we too scared or we plainly put not interested even one bit...The Oil base is closely guarded (the paki prez can use such kind of security)..And so our veer jawans instead of directly taking out the oil well and with it everyone around, start killing the Pakistani soldiers one by one and that too in putting US to shame style. While US uses carpet bombs, India sacrifices one cruise missile per soldier. So the funda for attack..take a aim at a soldier, take him out with a missile...One man One Missile...At this rate I estimate India must be having atleast 3 million missiles(Strength of Pak + Chinese Army). Coming back to the story Pakistani soldiers use their AK's to fire at the Mirage's and they manage to shoot down 2 planes...Jimmy's and the third guy's. The inventor of Anti-aircraft missile on watching this drama unfold died again. Well Jimmy and the third guy safely eject out and are caught by the Pakistan Army and are put under indefinite arrest with no regards for the Geneva convention..hehe...Jimmy mentions this to the Paki general...its a bollywood movie...no one cares about Geneva buddy. The two of them are constantly questioned about their battalion and number of planes their base has which to say the least is ultra lame...why is the army interested in the battalion to which the soldiers belong...They are asked no further questions...In prison they meet another old war veteran the indispensable Kiran Kumar...who has tried to break out of the prison 17 times without luck...At one time he managed to reach the Afghan border where he was caught again...what an idiot..when you are near the India Pak border why in the name of god would you start running towards west when India is definitely on the east...what a loser...running for 1100 miles when the Indian border was only 11 miles. Well taking inspiration from him, Jimmy and the third guy plan to break out of the prison Shawshank style...They get a small scythe hidden in a book from Brijesh Hirjee(a supplier in prison). They manage to put Tim Robbins to utter shame by making a big enough hole in the wall in days...who the hell thought of wasting 28 years in prison...After a showdown with the Pak army, they manage to run away and this time in the right direction. They are being constantly chased by a pack of Pak soldiers lead by Ashish Vidyarthi aka Quereshi...And every 5 minutes they run into a 8-10 Paki soldiers(not more not less) which they kill off showing air force's superior prowess over the army. They also manage to run into Rahul Dev in the jungles who now after his fatal crash is living alone in a cave killing rabbits with his pistol for food...As the group of 4 now near the Indian border, its time for some Qurbaani's baby...As is everyone's guess...Kiran baby its time for you to go...And Rahul baba...bahut hua rabbit meat...ab bhagwaan bula rahe hai...Both of them are killed by Quereshi's sniping prowess who need a sniper to kill them only 100 feet away...Well done lad...While Quereshi is bus sniping, Jimmy and third guy kill off all his goons...but Viola!!!...All of them Regenerate...not once but twice...India needs to develop this technology super quick or otherwise our fate is sealed...But ultimately they die the third time with Jimmy and the third guy both getting shot in the legs...When they are about to be sniped in comes Shamita with her Chopper and kills Quereshi and saves the day.
The movie ended with plenty of questions unanswered. Why in the name of god Pakistan decides to attack India. Why does the airforce retaliates by taking out a Oil base..so that Pakistan cannot refuel their planes and attack us back?? Why is the name of of the movie AgniPankh when all these planes do is enter the Pakistan territory and get shot. After losing 180 precious minutes of my life watching the movie I've wasted several more thinking about and ultimately writing about the mockery going on in Bollywood. I mean seriously guys do these directors think we are that stupid...or they themselves are that stupid that all they can come up with all unconnected story lines and ultra pathetic subplots to take the already crappy story forward. God Help Bollywood!!!
My Recommendation: You cannot and i quote "cannot" afford to miss this movie...
