Movie World
Bollywood movies of 2018 that proved to be of mediocre quality – Part 5
Paltan
Director JP Dutta’s movie ‘Paltan’
tried to prove that wars are exercises in futility. The viewers found it to be
a tepid war drama. It spoke about a skirmish between India and China and how a
battalion of Indian soldiers saved the day. The movie has Arjun Rampal, Sonu
Sood, Harshvardhan Rane, Gurmeet Choudhry, Luv Sinha and Siddhant Kapoor. The
film was dramatic and jingoistic.
Paltan (transl. Platoon) is a 2018
Indian war film written, directed and produced by J. P. Dutta, based on 1967
Nathu La and Cho La clashes along the Sikkim border after 1962 Sino-Indian War.
It stars an ensemble cast with Jackie Shroff, Arjun Rampal, Sonu Sood,
Harshvardhan Rane, Esha Gupta, Sonal Chauhan and many more. The film was
theatrically released on 7 September 2018.
Reception
The film received generally average
to poor reviews. Audience and critics found the film's execution largely
ineffective for a war film with caricature characters and extremely long
runtime. Ronak Kotecha of The Times of India gave it 3/5 stars calling it a
long-drawn war-drama that picks up only during the final moments.
What ails JP Dutta’s Paltan? The filmmaker
depicted chest-thumping patriotism and genuine heartfelt emotion to prove that
any war was futile.
The film is based on a 1967
skirmish between Indian and Chinese troops near the Sikkim border. The movie is
a two-and-a-half hour slog.
The movie has comical Jackie Shroff,
playing a Major General with the sort of English accent which is weird. Arjun
Rampal plays Lieutenant Colonel with protecting the Nathu La Pass from possible
Chinese penetration. Then there are bravehearts and hotheads like Sonu Sood,
Harshvardhan Rane and Gurmeet Choudhary who speak exclusively in slogans. All
these characters get emotional flashback scenes involving elderly parents,
loving partners, or innocent children. The enemy is always sneaky and resorts
to dishonorable actions. Paltan features the most comical villains.
In the end Paltan is too long and boring.
The big war scene – all sound and fury – is saved for the film’s climax. The
entire film is based on tried-and-tested formula. The film got a tired feel to
it.
The finale is uninspiring on many
counts. The characters seen across the large ensemble cast are predictable. You
leave the theatre somewhat wondering what the fuss was all about. Some scenes
are very blurry and unimpressive.
Dutta also fails to dish out
anything special when highlighting how personal lives get affected after a
soldier's death. In vPaltan, no one comes out determined to break their acting
sterotype. All this makes the film length of 170 minutes turgid at times.
Sitting through JP Dutta's poorly
enacted, overwritten war film is a battle in itself. The middle 100 minutes are
repetitive, poorly enacted, overwritten and unimaginatively directed. In a
terribly acted post-script, we see another set of wailing family members, which
negates any props Dutta earned with the cross-border battle between Indian and
Chinese troops.
Dutta gives some of these men very
filmy back-stories, which allows him to take his camera and the viewer away
from the stark landscape, where most of the action unfolds, into blander
territory. These scenes are superfluous since they do not achieve what they
should have. The characters are cardboard cutouts, and the actors are playing
versions of toy soldiers. The actors playing the Chinese counterparts resort to
glaring and grimacing, which would be fine in Kung Fu Hustle, but not in a
serious war drama. Some smart war tactics consist of just finger-pointing and
playground provocation. Finally Paltan is tentative even in its jingoism.
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