Trust Akshay Kumar to always be at the top of his game when telling powerful stories inspired by true events and stories of unknown warriors.
In his latest project, “Mission Raniganj”: The Great Bharat Rescue, the actor plays the role of Coal India’s mining manager, Jaswant Singh Gill and does his best to save the lives of 70 people.
Miners were trapped in the mine flood. Mahabir coal mine, Raniganj, West Bengal, 1989. In the race against time, all conventional methods fail, and Gill comes up with ‘jugaad’ to save the miners.
Kumar’s impressive performance shows that Gill’s character is quite believable, but the storytelling does not do it justice. Director Tinu Suresh Desai has written this script to keep you engaged and engaged and there are many serious moments in it.
But he did not allow his hero to come to the fore and relegate the story to the background.
In the scene where Kumar spends so much screen time, the importance of his actions and efforts rather than the plight of the miners struck me deeply. Then maybe you’ll feel like you can care for others, too.
About movie
At 2 hours 18 minutes, “Mission Raniganj” is well-timed, but the first half takes forever to build the plot. It is overloaded with jargon and machinery mumbo jumbo that gets too much to take in all at once.
It’s only in the final minutes of pre-interval that the story picks up, and the second half gains momentum. That’s when you feel the tension that the miners are also feeling.
The story by Vipul K. Rawal had so much more to be told than just one night. Dialogues written by Deepak Kingrani are average and rarely call for any whistles or loud cheers.
That being said, I must say that the way Kumar manages to land jokes, even in the most intense scenes, is commendable.
The film overall leaves you with a sense of victory and feeling proud of having heroes like Gill, yet you wish the story had more soul and depth and rose beyond the heroic deeds to give way to some more humanism.
