This is a girl who has already been through an abusive marriage and is now on track for bigger and better things.įlight 73 is her first as Head Purser, she is three days away from her birthday, and back home in Bombay there is a boy who adores her and sneaks her cookies.Īll would be well with her world if not for the dramatic attack on her plane and the gun barrel shoved roughly into her face. Her life isn't picture-perfect, even if she does look perfect in pictures. Sonam Kapoor is exceptional as Neerja Bhanot, a girl who knows her place and won't back down. He makes for a remarkably effective villain, all growls and snarls, one so consumed with his motives that his fellow terrorists begin to fear him - but he meets his match in one Indian girl. One of these, Khalil, is particularly feral and, played by Jim Sarbh, looks like a bloodthirsty version of Sacha Baron Cohen. In an emotive blend of Dog Day Afternoon and Captain Phillips, Madhvani throws together a savage quartet of terrorists and lets them loose upon an unsuspecting planeful of passengers, most of whom would have been waiting for the drink service to begin. The plane goes from Bombay to Karachi without a hitch, with a Captain Snipes trying out his newly-learnt Hindi on the indulgent passengers. Most of the film takes place on board Flight 73, and Madhvani grounds the proceedings in detail, making sure everything is right, from period plane to passengers to Palestinians.
These minor rough edges smoothen out well in time for take-off.
There is also excessive foreshadowing for the tragedy we already know will follow, even though it is handled cleanly enough. The dialogue is a tad clunky, each Rajesh Khanna reference underscored by the word ' babumoshai', as if the man made no other films, Neerja's mom is a touch too overt in her sentimentality, and the background score for the terrorists is thickly ominous and hinting at muezzins - alternated with Neerja reading the Hanuman Chalisa before setting off. The film opens with shots of Neerja merrymaking with her family, interspersed with shots of Palestinian terrorists preparing for their task, and there is a touch of heaviness at the outset. Madhvani approaches the tale with a cold, even chilling, efficiency, but he takes a while to settle in. The situation - that of being aboard a 1986 flight hijacked in Karachi by a rabid group of violent terrorists - is an impossible, helpless, doomed one, and there is no right answer as to how one ought behave in a situation like that.Īnd yet here we have the strikingly inspirational account of a smart young woman who, when she finds herself flung into a nightmare, chooses to protect rather than cower.
Movies about hijacks are usually resolved by force - either mental, by a gifted negotiator, or, as is most often the case, physical, by a superhuman leading man yippee-ki-yaying his way through all odds - but Neerja's story, one worth celebrating, is a triumph of conviction and of spirit. Ram Madhvani's film captures Neerja's effervescence and her professionalism, getting us invested in the character long before we see her take wing and be astonishing, inspirational and incredible in the face of fear.
She loved her job, making it up the Pan Am ranks to become a Head Purser before she turned 23. We meet, instead, Neerja Bhanot: a poised and cool Rajesh Khanna fangirl, a doted-on daughter, a neighbourhood favourite, a young girl who enjoyed smiling for the cameras. Watch Neerja (2016) Streaming Now Without Downloading.One minute into Neerja, and Sonam Kapoor disappears.
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