India seems to be fulfilling the role of providing moviegoers with the kind of high-octane, masculine, testosterone-driven pulp that we used to get from the 1980s and to a lesser extent the 1990s. A good example of one of their more highly anticipated action-laced films is Aditya Datt’s Commando 3.
The official trailer dropped back on October 23rd, 2019 and already it’s managed an impressive 23 million views on Reliance Entertainment’s YouTube channel.
It’s safe to say that a large portion of the movie-going audience seems potentially excited for the upcoming flick, and you can check out the trailer below to see why.
The film is about a mysterious terrorist from India trying to create a civil war by getting Muslim extremists to rise up and attack certain hot spots around the world. Indian intelligence manages to intercept three young boys working for the man and discover that he’s planning on launching an attack in London, England.
Unlike American films, India isn’t afraid to paint Muslims as the bad guys, nor are they afraid to show the good guys get extreme on the extremists.
Top commando Karan Signh Dogra sets out to track down the man with the help of Bhavna, Malika Sood, and Armaan Akhtar from British Intelligence. I’m not entirely fond of the main hero having two chicks as sidekicks, but at least they’re there for eye-candy and they don’t appear to get in his way, as he seems to handle most things on his own.
Nevertheless, the team fight their way through terrorist forces while also dealing with a hit-squad sent out to take them down.
We’ve been seeing a recent trend in Bollywood films where the directors bypass the more ridiculous wire-work that their films used to be known for, like in the Dhoom series or Singham, and go for more grounded action. Their recent action films have relied more on believable set pieces and cool fight sequences that more closely mirror the 1980s’ style Hong Kong action flicks than the wire-fu from the 1970s or all those terrible Hollywood flicks post-Matrix.
In some ways it feels like betrayal; that the action fanfare that cinephiles desire out of moving pictures has to be acquired from foreign movie studios instead of from American soil.
But alas, if India is going to keep producing films like War and the Commando series, then I can’t complain too much. At least we’re getting a healthy dose of fictional violence and testosterone-driven thrills from somewhere… even if it’s not from Hollywood.
You can look for Commando 3 to make its way into theaters outside of the U.S., starting November 29th.
