War 2 Movie Review: Caution: If you’re going to watch War 2, we urge you to forget about War for the next few hours. If there’s any way you can sit through this Hrithik Roshan, Jr NTR and Kiara Advani starrer, it’s only through selective memory loss. Because if you keep comparing it to War, you’ll be disappointed. Don’t get us wrong. War 2 has almost all the ingredients to make a quintessential YRF Spy Universe film. It’s ambitious too and ambition is good but it’s the execution where the film falters.
The template is so formulaic that War 2 emerges as a jaded, done-to-death, globetrotting actioner. An espionage thriller is supposed to have a hero, a good guy-turned-arch-nemesis who feels that he has been wronged by a compatriot and a beauty-with-brains kind of a female spy, with dollops of gravity-defying action and a sexy dance number. But where’s the novelty? Where are the layers of storytelling? And most importantly, where’s the thrill? Sadly, War 2 is all style and no ammo.
The film opens with a sequence in Kamakura, Japan, where we’re reintroduced to a pumped-up Kabir. He engages in a fight sequence with sword-wielding men dressed up as Nightwalkers. He then walks out of what looks like a tavern and the action shifts to the skies. He flies alongside a helicopter (yes, you read that right) and manages to get hold of his target and kills him. Later, Kabir befriends his werewolf pet and they walk out like royalty with a slow-motion effect and a pulsating score playing in the background.
Following this mission, Kabir has to now work for Kali, a Manticore-esque syndicate (remember Citadel?) comprising some of the wealthiest businesspersons and politicians to bring down India’s democracy and it’s ‘old-fashioned deshbhakts’. And their first mission requires him to kill his mentor, Colonel Luthra. Here, we’re introduced to his daughter, Wing Commander Kavya Luthra. RAW sets out to finish Kabir but the question is, is Kabir really working for Kali? Will this ‘perfect warrior’ shift his allegiance? You know the answer.
To get hold of Kabir, RAW hires Vikram, an over-confident, narcissistic and badass spy. But there’s something else dating back to their teenage years that ties Kabir and Vikram, who was then known as Raghu. How will Raghu’s resurgence in his life change his destiny? Are they brothers or nemeses? The story is thin, not lean in a sleek way, but hollow in a ‘was there a draft two?’ kind of way. The first half drags through exposition that tries to feel mysterious but mostly feels padded. The second half takes an abysmal dip and never completely comes back to the surface.
At 2 hours 50 minutes, War 2 tries to go full throttle but often skids into chaos. A thriller of this scale definitely needed crisper editing. Instead, what we get is a bunch of long-drawn flashbacks that dilute the pace, stripping the film of any solid edge-of-the-seat, nail-biting moment. But what needs to be truly spoken about are its action sequences. One thing is clear – Kabir and Vikram/Rahu are immortal. Nothing can kill them. Bullets, swords, fire, icicles, nothing. Most importantly, they can fly. They fly over land and water.
