After the over-exaggerated stunts of Satyamev Jayate 2, John Abraham returns in impressive action form with Attack, as India’s 1st super soldier.
Read Attack Movie Review –
Director: Lakshya Raj Anand
Cast: John Abraham, Rakul Preet Singh, Jacqueline Fernandez
Rating: 3/5
Runtime: 2h 3m
Storyline:
Action star John Abraham has again chosen the patriotism route but this time with a tadka of sci-fi. No over-the-top Parliament table breaking (remember Satyamev Jayate 2?) in Attack thankfully. He’s a badass when he enters the Parliament now and if he’s single-handedly crushing his enemies, at least he’s got IRA – the snarky female AI (Artificial Intelligence) to thank for his superhero abilities.
After a cheesy start to his love story with Ayesha (Jacqueline), Attack dives straight into the action – John Abraham as soldier Arjun Shergill is left reeling from a physical and emotional loss after a devastating terror attack.
Paralyzed from the neck down and with nothing left to lose, Arjun signs up to be the guinea pig for the AI program. He gets a chip implanted in his body which transforms him into a super-soldier, helping him regain his mobility, have faster reflexes and be an overall super-cool killing machine. His AI ‘IRA’ is like the Indian ‘Jarvis’ here (She’s pretty fun, not gonna lie).
Now, the Government wants their newly modified superhero to go out and combat terrorism immediately. But Arjun’s past emotional trauma proves to be a roadblock from achieving full sync with his AI, thus hindering his abilities at times.
Watch Attack to see John Abraham unlock his potential as a superhero and give a tagda jawab to terrorism!
What Do We Think?
The premise is interesting indeed – integrating AI-enhanced soldiers into warfare. One line particularly stands out – ‘Today’s fiction is tomorrow’s reality.’
Attack is technically sound and the VFX is quite neat and it’s a good attempt at introducing this particular superhero genre into mainstream Bollywood. While John is convincing as an action hero, he lacks a little bit in the emotional scenes.
For action films to work, the emotional core has to click. While on paper the tragic backstory does sound touching, sadly John-Jacqueline’s chemistry is rather lacklustre and cheesy and we don’t get invested in it. Also, after Bachchan Paandey this is the 2nd time this year, Jacqueline’s playing the doe-eyed love interest who is dead within 5 mins of her screen time!
She gets the shorter end of the stick here while Rakul gets the meatier role as the scientist Sabah Qureshi. Rakul gives a decent enough performance as she rattles off all the science-y stuff. Maybe we’ll see more of her inventions in the next part.
We wish that the scenes with the AI IRA were more fleshed out and there were more ‘training’ sequences. Coz otherwise, the transition from broken soldier to battlefield mode feels too rushed. John-IRA dynamic is pretty sarcastic and cool though and we want to see where the franchise takes them.
Hit Or Miss?
Attack deserves a watch and some support! Let’s see if this experiment pays off or not. The premise is promising and we hope Attack Part 2 elevates it further. Watch it for the stylish action sequences and the witty John-IRA partnership!
Attack is currently out in the theatres.
