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A sequel to a cult classic and 1997’s biggest hit, Border, its sequel Border 2’s inspiration, according to its co-producer Bhushan Kumar, came after Gadar 2’s enormous success. Sunny Deol from the first film as well as the Gadar franchise came in as the main leading man, and Anu Malik and Javed Akhtar came in for the earlier film’s chartbusters. Clearly, the idea was also to cash in on success and ROI!
The best thing that happened, however, was that a sensitive and sensible director, Anurag Singh, was chosen. This, along with his script (with Sumit Arora), ensured that the film was not made just as a means of monetary returns. Apart from a career in Punjabi films, Singh has made the gripping yet unsuccessful Raqeeb in Hindi and the patriotic Kesariin 2019. His sense of drama, emotions and patriotism are clearly evident in his work again.
The ‘story’ is by Nidhi Dutta, daughter of the original writer-director-producer J.P. Dutta, who has also co-produced this film. Focusing again on the 1971 Indo-Pak war, the film brings in the backstories of three of the four protagonists in the national training academy for our armed forces as well as that of Lt. Col. Fateh Singh Kaler (Sunny Deol), who grooms them.
Fateh Singh has a robust and roaring persona and is yet very clear about his fundas. He encourages his son, Angad Singh (Guneet Sandhu) to enlist in the Army when his wife, Simi (Mona Singh) opposes the idea. The other three bosom friends, Hoshiar Singh Dahiya (Varun Dhawan), Flight Officer Nirmaljit Singh Sekhon (Diljit Dosanjh) and Lt. Commander Mahendra Singh Rawat (Ahan Shetty) are in awe of him, and soon join the Army, Air-Force and Navy respectively.
Each of the four have their stories, and the first half basically concentrates on their sagas and is filled with humor, pathos and emotional highs. Hoshiar Singh weds Dhanvanti Devi (Medha Rana), ending his lonely spell: he has no one else in his immediate family until Nirmaljit ’s clan ‘adopts’ him as their own. Nirmaljit marries Manjit (Sonam Bajwa), while Mahendra Singh is shown married to Sudha (Anya Singh) and they have a daughter.
When war is incipient, the three youngsters are together and pledge to beat the hell out of the enemy. When it does erupt, the action in the second half gets more than a tad ‘filmi’. Fateh Singh and Hoshiar Singh become like rampaging superheroes and even the personal element comes when Fateh comes face to face with his son’s killer.
Nirmaljit and Mahendra fight like film heroes too, annihilating the enemy in a way that looks barely realistic. In all the sound and fury, the script makes space for a considerable number of lip-sync as well as background songs, and in the first half, the music nails a lie: that lip-synched songs today can sound unrealistic.
The way the song, Tara rum pum pum, is filmed shows that such songs do not just boost the emotional voltage but also up the entertainment quotient. Most of the original songs work while on but lack the pure shelf-life of the Anu Malik re-creations like Ghar kab aaoge (Sandesen aate hain) and Jaate hue lamhon.
John Stewart Eduri’s background score is skilled, and there is not a dull moment despite the 199-minute length of the film, which speaks well for the editing by Manish More. Anshul Chaube’s cinematography is first-class oftener than not, but some of the shots look fake because of the uneven VFX.
The dialogues are superb, but what I liked best about the film was its unique approach in the first half to the overall saga, part-based on four real characters. The human element and the soul dominate, and it is completely enthralling and slick, even making us feel that the advent of war (which is set to come on screen!) will be a bit of a spoiler in the proceedings of a very human drama.
The battles and war thus go in the league of the film’s predecessor as well as recent outings like 120 Bahadur, and lack the realism of Ikkis, if comparisons must be done! Yes, the human side is shown, especially in the initial conflict of Hoshiar Singh with the Pakistani soldiers. Pakistan’s real-life chief Yahya Khan (Madhur Arora) is kept subdued—he could have become a caricature, and the script studiously and thankfully avoids that tempting cliche!
The camaraderie between the other soldiers is also shown well, especially between Santram (Vansh Bhardwaj) and Nishaan Singh (Paramvir Cheema). The romance is underplayed and handled very well, and the tropes—the painting by Mahendra’s daughter, Angad’s last letter in Fateh Singh’s pocket and the memory of the Indian children with Nirmaljit, as well as the ‘eternal’ lamp lit by a soldier in the hope that the displaced Indian villagers will return to their homes after the enemy is beaten are all used well.
Sunny Deol and Ahan Shetty are very good, the former with his usual power. I found Varun Dhawan and Diljit Dosanjh terrific, and Mona Singh superlative. Among the rest, Vansh Bhardwaj and Paramvir Cheema stand out. Medha Rana is pleasant, and Sonam Bajwa, Ishika Gagneja, Hardip Gill and Neeta Mohindra as Nirmaljit’s family spot-on.
To sum up, Border 2 relies heavily on sentiment to hook and grip the viewer and succeeds to a good extent. Its box-office success is guaranteed, but the extent of that remains to be seen, as it could have followed the realism of the first half and steered clear of convenient pandering to star images in the second.
But on the whole, Border 2 is a sequel that is imaginative overall and impressive in most parts.
Rating: ***1/2
JP Films’ & T-Series Films’ Border 2 Produced by: J.P. Dutta, Nidhi Dutta, Bhushan Kumar & Krishan Kumar Directed by: Anurag Singh Written by: Nishi Dutta, Anurag Singh & Sumit Arora Music: Anu Malik, Mithoon, Sachet-Parampara, Vishal Mishra & Gurmoh Starring: Sunny Deik, Varun Dhawan, Ahan Shetty, Diljit Dosanjh, Mona Singh, Anya Singh, Sonam Bajwa, Medha Rana, Vansh Bhardwaj, Paramvir Cheema, Ishika Gagneja, Hardip Gill, Neeta Mohindra, Guneet Sandhu, Anurag Arora, Angad Singh, Madhur Arora, Azad Chauhan, Bhushan Vikas & others
