War

About the film

War is a 2019 Indian Hindi-language action thriller film directed by Siddharth Anand and produced by Aditya Chopra under Yash Raj Films. The third installment in the YRF Spy Universe, it stars Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff in the lead roles, with Vaani Kapoor and Ashutosh Rana. In the film, an Indian RAW agent is assigned to eliminate his former mentor who has gone rogue.

Principal photography commenced in September 2018. Tentatively titled Fighters, the title of War was announced on 15 July 2019. The film was made on an estimated budget of ₹150 crore (US$16 million) with a further ₹20 crore (US$2.1 million) spent on print and advertising. Vishal–Shekhar composed the soundtrack, with the background score composed by Sanchit Balhara and Ankit Balhara, replacing Anand's frequent collaborators Salim–Sulaiman.

Plot

In New Delhi, Major Kabir Dhaliwal is assigned to assassinate an Iraqi terrorist named Farid Haqqani, but instead kills veteran RAW agent V. K. Naidu declaring himself rogue. Defence Minister Sherna Patel and Colonel Sunil Luthra assign Kabir's former student Captain Khalid Rahmani to eliminate him.

In a flashback, Khalid yearns to join Kabir's squad, but is initially rejected due to his father Major Abdul Rahmani betraying the army in a previous mission, leaving Kabir with two gunshot wounds and his partner dead. After being persuaded by Luthra, Kabir is openly hostile towards Khalid and reluctantly agrees to let Khalid join his team. The squad consists of agents Saurabh, Prateek, Muthu and Aditi.

The team goes on a successful mission in Tikrit, Iraq to kill Haqqani's associates and are able to arrest a terrorist named Basheer Hassib, causing their main target Rizwan Ilyasi, a terrorist turned businessman to come out of hiding. Despite the mission's success, Kabir notices that Khalid missed many of his targets from his right side and lacks peripheral vision, leading to Kabir threatening Khalid for removal from his squad. Khalid reveals that as a result of his father's betrayal, his eyesight was partially damaged due to a bullying incident in his childhood. Seeing his love for his mother and country, Khalid gains Kabir's trust and gets reinstated. The team captures Ilyasi in a mission in Marrakesh, during which Ilyasi informs Kabir that he planted a mole within the team. Saurabh reveals himself as the mole and kills Prateek and Muthu. A shootout ensues between Kabir and one of Ilyasi's men. Kabir gets shot in neck and wakes up in a hospital. Few days later, he meets an injured Khalid who tells him that he killed Saurabh.

Production

On Yash Chopra's birth anniversary and following the success of Ek Tha Tiger (2012), Yash Raj Films announced a new action film starring Hrithik Roshan and Tiger Shroff. Vaani Kapoor was finalised to play the female lead. Action Choreographers, Paul Jennings and Se-Oh Yeong were employed to design the action sequences.

The climax scene of the film was shot on the Arctic Circle; the first Indian film to do so. Siddharth Anand, the director of the film stated, "We want to push the benchmark of action movies that are made in our country. So, we are bringing two of the biggest action choreographers together to design some of the most outlandish and visually-spectacular sequences. On one hand, we have Andy R Armstrong from Hollywood and on the other, we have Mr SeaYoung Oh, who is an outstanding martial arts action choreographer from South Korea."

Principal photography began in the second week of September 2018. The film also had a dance off between the two stars in the song "Jai Jai Shivshankar". The film schedule was wrapped up in the beginning of March 2019. The film was shot in multiple exotic locations across Delhi, Uttarakhand, Kerala, Portugal, Italy (Amalfi, Capri, Positano, Matera), Finland, Sweden, Georgia and Australia. The bike chase sequence between the two stars was filmed in Portugal. The car chase sequence which was the climax of the film was shot at the Arctic Circle.

Music

The music of the film is composed by Vishal–Shekhar, while lyrics are written by Kumaar in his first formal collaboration with Yash Raj Films. All themes are composed by Sanchit Balhara and Ankit Balhara, who replaced director Siddharth Anand's frequent collaborators Salim-Sulaiman.

Release

A teaser for the film was displayed through roadblock advertising on the Star India network, sparking speculations that this was due to Roshan's and Shroff's recent satellite deals and associations with the television network. However, it was later revealed that the network and Yash Raj Films had struck a longterm deal, with earlier YRF titles also slowly finding their way to the network.

The film was released on 2 October 2019, coinciding with Gandhi Jayanti.

Reception

War opened with collection of ₹53.35 crore on its first day. It was the highest opening day collection for a Hindi film. On its second day, it collected ₹24.35 crore. On the third day, it collected ₹22.45 crore, taking its total collection to ₹100.15 crore. War created six new records as the film reached to ₹100 crore mark at the box-office. The film entered the 100 Crore Club in three days of its release. The extended opening weekend collection of the film at ₹166.25 crore is the highest opening weekend collection for any 2019 Bollywood film. The film by crossing ₹200 crore in its opening week has become the fastest Bollywood film of 2019 to achieve the feat.

Key details