Partly by choice, partly through circumstance, 120 Bahadur is out of sync with the times. Razneesh Ghai’s film, about a famous battle in the Sino-Indian war of 1962, chooses to be stirring, even square. Most Hindi war films adopt a very different tone now. Some viewers might be reminded of the wholesomeness of Lakshya, directed by Farhan Akhtar, 120 Bahadur’s lead actor. That film was made 21 years ago but it may as well be 40 considering how little it has in common with hard, cynical, triumphant films like Uri and Shershaah and Fighter.
What Ghai and Akhtar couldn’t have guessed is how global alliances would swing. A film about Chinese forces on India’s borders must’ve seemed like a natural way to address a situation that had been simmering for years, and briefly exploded in the Galwan clashes of 2020. But a month after the film was announced in September 2024, an agreement was reached between the countries to de-escalate and create a buffer zone. Recent tensions between the US and India further thawed relations with China; prime minister Modi visited there in August for the first time in seven years. Chinese goods are set to re-enter the Indian market. It feels like the moment to show the humbling of Gao and Mao has passed.
In November 1962, almost a month into the war, Lt. Col. Gao launches an offensive with an eye to capturing Chushul in Ladakh, which has a vital airstrip. For this, they have to negotiate the narrow pass at Rezang La. The defense of this pass falls to Charlie Company, a 120-strong battalion led by Major Shaitan Singh (Akhtar). Shaitan is introduced on a recce, walking alone into the open, seemingly inviting enemy fire. It turns out he’s secretly signalling to his soldier, hidden behind a rock face, exactly where the enemy sniper is, resulting in a kill and a warning. It’s a deft bit of writing by Rajiv G. Menon and Sumit Arora, giving us the measure of the man, a calm and calculated risk-taker and a leader by example.
120 Bahadur is at its best in the build-up to Rezang La (this battle also inspired 1964's Haqeeqat, the granddaddy of Indian war films). The scenes of roughhousing and trash-talking among the soldiers come with simple, memorable details. Two friends put on a wrestling match, the prize a bar of chocolate. Another is writing a letter to Madhubala. A curtailed singing career is given a small spotlight. None of this is wasted either. The chocolate bar resurfaces. And the light punishment of a night spent in the cold among goats and cows has a surprising tactical payoff.
The soldiers are all Ahirs—farmers by tradition—and the actors speak with a pleasing Haryanvi twang. Shaitan Singh is Rajput, though Akhtar opts for a neutral Hindi accent (Rashii Khanna, playing his wife, sounds Rajasthani). Akhtar's voice is as it’s always been, slightly hoarse, with a tendency to crack under pressure. It isn’t an instrument suited for big dramatic speeches, which is a problem once the Chinese start inflicting heavy casualties on Charlie Company. In the heat of battle, Akhtar overreaches, eyes bulging, line readings off-putting. It’s a messy end to a performance that until then is an appealingly low-key portrayal of military heroism.
Marek Svitek, responsible for the realistic-looking combat in All Quiet on the Western Front, is the film's action director. I liked the one-shot with Shaitan Singh moving carefully but decisively through the narrow lanes of a village under attack by Chinese soldiers (he switches to a pistol midway but holds on to his rifle, a nice detail). The fighting here, and elsewhere in 120 Bahadur, is less slick than what you’ll see in Hindi films today, and as a result more believable. Unfortunately, the final doomed stand slips into incoherence, a chaotic muddle of mini-battles that’s never clear about the larger picture.
It's hard not to see this as Akhtar (also a co-producer) revisiting the memory of Lakshya. The 2004 film presented the armed forces as the ultimate finishing school, where callow young men learn the value of camaraderie and patriotism. 120 Bahadur is nowhere near as effective, but it has a similar emotionality, with the violence of war interrupted by promises and tearful goodbyes. Even the Chinese commander—otherwise a heavy-jowled caricature—is allowed a moment of grace at the end. It’s a soft-edged vision of patriotic duty, best expressed by a scene where one soldier says he doesn’t feel the pang of separation from family as he has uncles and brothers here and is lying in his mother’s lap. It feels like a broadcast from a gentler time.
‘120 Bahadur’ is in theatres.
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