This inspired by true events biopic is crowd-pleasing cinema at its best. An ordinary Joe goes toe to toe with heartless billionaires, conniving moneylenders and unfair bureaucracy all in an attempt to make life better and easier for people like him. Will he succeed?? The set-up answers its own question, but the joy of Sarfira is that the system is rigged enough and the money at stake is high enough that you get invested almost in spite of yourself. It also features enough schmaltz to frost every cupcake between here and Mumbai, but done in the service to the plot. It’s also impossible to imagine a western movie star (male edition) being willing to cry so hard and so helplessly on camera for so long. This makes Sarfira a crowd-pleaser in the best sense of the word.
The story of Sarfira
It’s the late nineties and Vir (Akshay Kumar) is an ex-air force pilot with a dream: budget airline travel. Short-hop flights on safe and clean but basic planes was a revolutionary idea back then, anywhere in the world. In India, there were further obstacles: excellent long-distance sleeper trains, the monopoly existing airlines maintained with travel agents, and the cultural determination to gatekeep flying as a luxury for higher-caste people only. Even with the devoted help (and life savings) of Vir’s best friends Che (Krishnakumar Balasubramanian) and Sam (Saurabh Goyal), there are many, many obstacles to Vir’s idea getting off the ground. Fortunately, Vir knows the excellence of his idea and thanks to his aviation background knows he can make it a reality. It’s just whether anybody will give him the opportunity to do it. The main opportunity lies with the wealthy and powerful Paresh (Paresh Rawal), who owns a major airline. Or does it?
As the years progress and there are setbacks galore, there’s also the question of Rani (Radhika Madan), a rather younger woman who’s a candidate for an arranged marriage with Vir, although her boldness and the fact she has rejected twenty previous suitors are two strikes against her. But Rani is also ambitious, with plans to run a bakery, and when she meets Vir she realises his first commitment is to his airline. Come back when it’s more than an idea, she tells him, and saunters off. To this Vir can only smile as his mother (Seema Biswas) and cousin Mandan (Anil Charanjeett) laugh that he’s met his match.
Their unusual courtship and sparky dynamic is the sharpest part of this classic underdog story, but the rapport between Miss Madan and Mr. Kumar has enough bite to counteract the many spoonfuls of sugar in the script director Sudha Kongara co-wrote with Shalini Ushadevi. Ms. Kongara understands how to play audience emotions like a maestro and further turns the musical sequences into inspired commentary on Vir’s changing states of mind. The grand finale involves several little old ladies in tears of joy and disbelief, among many other things, and a clever little montage about how things worked out in real life. Considering that Ms. Kongara adapted this Hindi-language film from the Tamil-language version of this story she directed in 2020, she’s had plenty of practice of playing the heartstrings.
But Sarfira’s main achievement is this: cheap flights are so basic and ordinary an idea that it’s hard to imagine the time when they didn’t exist, even for those of us who well remember twenty years ago. It’s rare that a work of art ensures that the impact of such a basic idea comes across as thoroughly as it did at the time. This is where the schmaltz comes in of course, but of course it should. It’s good when people do things to make life easier for others, and it’s bad when people refuse to alter their luxuries so others can have the basics. It’s a simple idea but done right, as Sarfira does it, it can be revolutionary. It’s a charming night at the movies.
Sarfira recently played in theaters.
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