Digital magazine - On Kargil Vijay Diwas: Bollywood, Why So Non Serious!

By Sanskriti Tomar

Today the nation observes the 20th anniversary of Kargil Vijay Diwas. The war was fought in the inhospitable terrain of Ladakh and won by the Indian Army.

FilmiFiles brings to you the Bollywood take on the wars fought by India, or the lack thereof.

The war brought to light, heroes like Vikram Batra and Yogendra Yadav. While there have been movies like LOC and Lakshya that are based on the Kargil War and it’s defining feature- The Tiger Hill.

There, however, is a chasm in indian cinema when it comes to the making of war movies and movies based on the lives of indian war heroes.

Hollywood doles out innumerable war movies year after year. From the recent masterpieces like ‘Dunkirk’ (2017) or ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ (2012), to the timeless movies like ‘Saving Private Ryan’ (1998), ‘The Pianist’ (2002) or ‘The Schindler’s List’ (1993). World War 2 itself has more than a dozen movies made in the past few decade.

Movies like ‘Inglorious Basterds’ (2009), Pearl Harbour (2001) and ‘Causalities of War’ (1989).

Hollywood lives by the glory that comes with the famous tenet- Deluce et Décorum est. It shows In the choice of movies in the timeline American cinema.

Indian Cinema more so “Bollywood”, on the other hand, has given only a handful of war movies to choose from.

While we make a lot of movies on patriotism and nationalism every year, we do not make movies on the wars we’ve fought.

There are a few movies based on our war of freedom, and another bunch of movies based on our wars with Pakistan.

They follow a monotone of plots and war cries, and most of them are made on the pattern of a ‘Masala Movie’ instead of being made as a serious war movie.

There are hardly any movies based on sino-indian war at all.

Being a colony of the British Government, indian soldiers also participated in both the World Wars too. We have absolutely no movies based on the story if indian army’s involvement In the Great Wars.

While some Independent short film makers have made documentaries and short films on these topics, none of them are adequate enough to be propagated.

We have focused our war movie fan base entirely on the Wars with Pakistan, and we have made the wars seem unrealistic in these movies.

Songs and dance do not have a place in War Movies, yet we make them for the masses as a form of pulp fiction instead of a serious form of cinema.

Hollywood recently launched an epic, ‘Dunkirk’, which was made by one of the best directors of Hollywood, Christopher Nolan. It won three Academy Awards in 2018.

Bollywood is still playing Border and Sarfarosh on the repeat in Indian television.

It is about time we came out of the afterglow of ‘Sandeshe Aate Hein’, and take war-movies more seriously.

But then, Indian Army and the wars fought by our nation are a sensitive topic in our heart. Bollywood shies away from them for this explicit reason.

India needs it’s heroes depicted in it’s movies. Airlift and Madras Café have done a lot of good to the indian morale but It is time our confidence was raised for our borders.

We need to see the heroes that hold the safety of our International Borders and LOC.