Lakshya is director Farhan Akhtars second film, after the amazing, Dil Chahta Hai.
Lakshya stars Hrithik Roshan and Priety Zinta in the lead roles. The movie is set in the beautiful Ladakh region of J&K. I went to watch the first show of the movie yesterday with a few friends, and the theatre was full.
The movie starts off very well, with Hrithik looking better than ever before in his sort of army style hair-cut. Special mention right now for the picturization of the beautiful Ladakh region, its just a STUNNING place, and definately very well shot.
Hrithik plays Karan Shergill, a 20-something who is quite clueless as to what his calling in life is.. Hrithik In my opinion does not suit that kind of role the best, as he appears just a bit too overzealous in trying to be funny with the faces and the noises, and is not a natural at playing a more comic role.
His girlfriend is Priety Zinta who plays Romila Dutta( a clear ripoff on NDTV’s Barkha Dutt, even the last names match), she plays a girl who is a sort of a student/protest leader in her college and knows exactly what she wants to do in life.
The script is very well done and some of the comments made by people in Shergill’s life, (his parents, Romila’s dad) find resonance with me and the sorta stuff I hear EVERYDAY.
The story starts off with Karan joining an Army regiment near the LoC in Kashmir, and then goes back into a flashback.
The part where Karan decides to join the army just because his friend wants to join is a bit weak, and I was left thinking about this for a while.
Much to the chagrin of his conservative father he writes the test for the IMA in Dehradun and aces it.
When he realises that the Army is no piece of cake, he leaves, and later overhearing his father’s taunts and Romila leaving him (beacuse of hs decision to quit), he returns to IMA in true hindi movie ishtyle with new josh and determination.
The story then cuts back to reality, and I thought that this was done quite well, as often this cutting back to reality is botched up. Hrithik later finds out that Romila goes around and gets engaged with someone else and the regular waterworks and the drunken song that I had half expected (as is de jure in Hindi movies) was not there!
The story then moves along to the start of a skirmish near the LoC., with the usual suspects (pakis, yaar) and Shergill’s Regt is assigned the task of kicking Paki a$$. After an initial attack, and a few casualties, we see Hrithik in full action.
At this point, I must again pay tributes to Farhan Akhtars directing, which in the war scenes is just too good, the background electric guitar work is also PERFECT and suits the war scenes well.
The stunts by Hrithik(if he has actually done them ) are also good.
The only drawback in the movie is the needlessness in introducing/giving Romila Dutta screen time after the interval. She comes into the picture in between battles(next morning) and messes the feel of the movie.
That left a sour taste, as did some moments in the first half.
Theres also cameo like roles by Amitabh Bachan and Amrish Puri, although in the end I left feeling that their roles should have been reversed, AB didnt seem to have that spark.
The music by Shankar Ehsaan and Loy is at best passable, with the guitar piece at the hill climb and ’main aisa kyun hu’ being the better tracks.
Lakshya shows the Army in a good light, and is very slick in its making. I especially liked the Officers Oath sequence and the hat toss, whch made a few hearts around the theatre swell with pride!
All in all, the movie is worth a dekko, however I wont shell out 100 or so bucks to watch it again!