Tezz

About the film

Tezz (transl. Fast) is a 2012 Indian Hindi-language action thriller film directed by Priyadarshan. It stars Anil Kapoor, Ajay Devgn, Kangana Ranaut, Zayed Khan, Sameera Reddy, Boman Irani with Mohanlal in an extended cameo appearance. The film revolves a team of Asians place a bomb on a high-speed train operating between London and Glasgow. The train will explode if it slows below a certain speed; unless a ransom is paid.

An unofficial adaptation of the 1975 Japanese film The Bullet Train, the film was released on 27 April 2012 and received mixed reviews, with praise for the premise and action sequences, and criticism for the writing. It emerged as a box-office bomb.

Plot

Aakash Rana is an illegal immigrant married to British-Indian citizen Nikita, who lives as a successful engineer. He is eventually caught and deported from the UK, thus crushing his dreams of an ideal life.

Four years later, Aakash returns with a vengeance on his mind and teams up with his former employees Aadil Khan and Megha to wreak some havoc. What follows is a bomb threat on a train and a tense railway control officer, Sanjay Raina, and anti-terrorism officer, Arjun Khanna, trying every trick in the book to avert the disaster and to apprehend the culprits. Sanjay Raina tries his best to save his daughter Piya, and the passengers in the train who are thrown in the mix are police officer Shivan Menon and his team of police force, who are escorting a prisoner on the same ill-fated train. Aakash demands 10 million euros to tell them how to disarm the bomb. The ministry does not want to give the money, but Khanna convinces them that the money will be given back and is a way to lure the terrorists.

After following Aakash's instructions and dropping the money in a river, he walks away. Megha gets the money and tries to get away. She evades the cops after a vicious chase, but unfortunately, she is killed by a van in an intersection. Khanna finds out that Khan is one of the bombers and chases him. Khan is shot in the leg, but he gets away after jumping from the bridge and landing on a jet ski driven by Aakash. Aakash once again demands money and asks it to be left in a dustbin. The dustbin falls inward, and Aakash runs away with the money even though the police attempt to pursue him.

Production

Describing the film as an emotional action thriller, Ajay Devgn clarified that contrary to speculations, he was not playing a terrorist but a vengeful emotional man who was against the system but did not intend to harm anyone. The filming began in 2010 but was interrupted for six months due to the cold. The shoot resumed in June 2011 and completed by July 2011. Initially, the work permits were denied for 14 of the crew members by the British authorities due to the film's terror theme. Priyadarshan resolved the issue by clarifying that the film was not about terrorism, and the man who held the speeding train to ransom did not represent any ideology or religion.

Most of the film was shot in Birmingham and some portions were shot in London. Zayed Khan, who trained in parkour for his role, revealed that the film was inspired from a Japanese film instead of the American film Speed or his own film of the same name. Anil Kapoor, who plays a character born and brought up in London, had to re-dub his lines after he watched the film and felt he was losing out on his voice and accent, which happened to be his USP. He also claimed to have done the film only for Priyadarshan since he had confidence in him as a filmmaker, and would not have done it for anyone else. Additionally, three different climaxes were shot for the film, with the final cut for all three versions readied so that there was no last-minute rush to technically process the film once it was time for release. At the same time, Priyadarshan was against the inclusion of an item song featuring Mallika Sherawat (Sameera Reddy was his choice) and tried getting it removed from the film, only to learn the song had been retained in all prints.

Upon the film's failure, Priyadarshan claimed that he had no authority over the final edit because the producers took over the film after the shoot and edited it themselves. As a result, the editing made it difficult for many people, including critics, to follow the film's narration. He claimed it was his mistake because he used to do all the post-production work, including editing, in Chennai, but this time, because the film was shot in Mumbai and abroad, he decided to do the post-production in Mumbai, which was when the producer took over the film from him.

Music

The film score and soundtrack was composed by the duo Sajid–Wajid, with the lyrics written by Shabbir Ahmed and Jalees Sherwani. It was released by Eros Music and Venus Records & Tapes. The music launch was held in Delhi on 30 March.

Joginder Tuteja from Bollywood Hungama gave the soundtrack 3 stars out of 5, remarking that it delivered slightly more than what one had expected from it, given the fact that the film was an action thriller. CNN-News18 similarly gave it 3 stars out of 5, feeling the album fell short of expectations, but there were a few tracks that managed to "bring about a smile on your face." On the other hand, Jaspreet Pandohar from BBC found it "plain and forgettable." Bangalore Mirror gave it 1 star out of 5, remarking that it was sure to leave a "bad tezz in your mouth."

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