Runway 34

One wishes that with some artistic ambition and imagination it had gathered better speed and altitude. Alas, it seems in more of a hurry to touch down and land than keep soaring high.

Ajay Devgn's Runway 34 breaks away from the Bollywood formula. The film is inconsistent, but also ambitious and in places, thrilling.

In its zeal to paint Vikrant a hero, despite clear signs of transgression, he is made into a saviour with a photographic memory whose heart is in the right place. And to that end, the plot reduces all the other actors to bit parts.

Runway 34 is ostensibly a male saviour drama. As if on cue, the women are presented as decorative objects written with wafer thin imagination.



A clumsy cocktail of Hollywood movies spiked with the Bollywood brand of God complex.

The pre-interval section hints at a potentially fair-minded portrait of human error. But the post-interval sections turn a short trip into a long-haul flight.

Runway 34 keeps you engrossed and makes you feel the turbulence while you're seated comfortably. It's edgy, fast-paced, engaging and serves you a big screen cinematic experience that won't disappoint.

Notwithstanding the bumps that it encounters along the way, Runway 34... has many a strong point, not the least of which is the fact that it wastes absolutely no time to touch cruising altitude.

The second half, of course, is a courtroom drama... Here is where the film collapses under the weight of its own culture.

Amitabh Bachchan is a sure bet in every film he appears in and this film too is no exception. We're riveted to the screen whenever he's around.