Director: Nikhil Nagesh Bhat
Writer: Nikhil Nagesh Bhat
Stars: Lakshya, Raghav Juyal, Ashish Vidyarthi
Synopsis: A passenger train bound for New Delhi becomes a bloody battleground of brutal close-quarters combat as a pair of commandos square off against a 40-strong army of invading bandits.
If Dev Patel did indeed break several toes and his hand over the course of Monkey Man’s production, one can only imagine how many injuries the punch-happy ensemble of Kill procured throughout filming. The 40-plus fighters on writer-director Nikhil Nagesh Bhat’s train ride from (and, perhaps, to) hell spend the majority of the action-thriller’s runtime taking hit after hit, stab upon stab, and every wound that could possibly be inflicted in between. Best of all: It’s all done in the name of our entertainment. Cinema is alive and well; sometimes, the more alive a movie is, the harder those within the film in question are trying to murder each other.
Nothing could be more true of Kill, Bhat’s Hindi-language answer to the question, “What if Die Hard, but on a train?”. Set on a choo-choo that appears to be traveling at Snowpiercer-like speed yet manages to make its regular stops a la your everyday Amtrak, Kill almost immediately introduces us to our main character, an army commando named Amrit (Lakshya, making his silver screen debut after a number of Indian television credits). While checking his phone upon returning from a recon mission, he finds dozens of distressed texts from his secret lover, Tulika (Tanya Maniktala), informing him that her father has arranged her marriage to another man. Responding as any hopeless romantic would, Amrit enlists his comrade, Viresh (Abhishek Chauhan), to join him on a cross-country train ride – the same one that Tulika and her family are also on – in order to properly crash the engagement party and prove his devotion to her parents. He even manages to find time during the early stages of the ride to pull her into the lavatory for an impromptu proposal, one that is far more romantic than whatever conversation she was roped into by her father and her predetermined in-laws.
It’s a prologue that, at first blush, feels clouded in forced exposition, but given what has yet to come, the emotional stakes this introduction provides are as important to Kill as its kills themselves. In short order, we are introduced to Fani (Raghav Juyal) and his crew of “dacoits” – a term used to describe bandits in India – a big band of big bads who are willing to terrorize the vessel’s passengers by any means necessary, as long as they get what they came for. What did they come for, exactly? Beyond some cash from wallets and noticeably expensive items that could be easily found in accessible luggage or on a passenger’s person, it’s not entirely clear. But the discovery that Tulika’s father, also a passenger, is the owner of Shanti Transport, a successful transit empire that could make this looting lot handsomely rich, adds fuel to Fani’s fire. As this skinny twerp of a villainous leader begins to wreak havoc on those inhabiting the locomotive, the more vengeful Amrit becomes, making for a rip-roaring massacre aboard a monorail that rivals, if not trumps, any action flick we’ve seen this year.
This all sounds relatively straightforward, a hero-versus-army-of-villains tale of revenge and power littered with uber-violent kills and enough gore to whet James Wan’s appetite. And if viewed through the lens of its premise and early action setpieces, Kill is a simple film, one in which our heroic commandants can be seen handily dispatching of their enemies with simultaneous kicks to the chest and nods to one another before preparing to take out their next targets. A standout gesture like this might seem cartoonish in a John Wick installment, but feels right at home in an Indian action epic backed by a studio more accustomed to the genre sensibilities associated with typical Bollywood projects; producer Karan Johar’s two pre-Kill credits were Selfiee, an action comedy, and Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani, a romantic comedy for the whole family to enjoy.
That’s not to say that your loved ones won’t enjoy Kill, just that it certainly features far more barbaric offings than even RRR, the most popular Indian film in recent memory – as far as American audiences are concerned – and that is a movie that sees a tiger burst from its cage to rip a British soldier to shreds during a battle scene. But to reduce Kill to what it says on the label, or to what it appears to be in its earliest stages, would be to disregard its complexities and thus its brilliance. Bhat sets his ultra-violent thriller apart by providing every character with just a little extra narrative juice to give each a reason to live, no matter if their last-seen act was bludgeoning an innocent occupant of Car A1 with a cleaver. Of course, Amrit’s motivations are easy enough to root for, but even Fani’s bandits have redeemable arcs, so to speak. These hungry, hungry henchmen aren’t simply soldiers in search of bloodshed, but an extended family of sorts; though Fani is helming the operation from inside the train, his father (Ashish Vidyarthi) is its mastermind, and many of the men within his troop are brothers, cousins, fathers, and uncles to one another.
It’s a development that complicates matters, not merely for the characters themselves, but for viewers. Sure, we want Amrit to defeat a particularly hulkish opponent with thumbs that could crush a skull like a Cheerio, but we can understand the anguish this big lug feels when he discovers that his uncle has been viciously murdered by Kill’s ostensible hero. Misdirections of this ilk keep us wary, not of cheering on Amrit, but about where we’re supposed to stand in regards to his adversaries. It’s only when the film reaches its shocking halfway point – which is marked by a belated title card that lands like an adrenaline shot straight to the aorta – that the opposition becomes truly irredeemable.
From this point forward, Amrit’s revenge tour travels from the conductor’s car to the caboose, fueled by the promise he made Tulika and her family at the film’s start: To keep them safe, no matter what. Along the way, he delivers another promise, this one to Viresh: “They are getting off this train, for sure,” he says of the bandits, “But only for their funeral.” Lines like these give Kill necessary moments of reprieve, for the violence it depicts truly strays into borderline stomach-churning territory, though the foot never comes off the gas for very long. A masterclass in choreography, this is a movie that manages to turn the most cramped corridors into battlegrounds, fire extinguishers into deadly weapons, and t-shirts into tourniquets, just like any good action film should, if not better. That Lakshya makes a dark horse bid for being the next James Bond with his performance as Amrit is all gravy.
It might have to be a package deal with Juyal, though; these nemeses pair almost too well to ever break up. Frankly, you might as well throw Bhat in that ring, too, but what this cast and crew have cooked up feels too singular to be placed in a Bond-like box, or any box for that matter, regardless of the fact that their thriller unfolds almost entirely within the confines of a high-speed rectangle. Kill is a film about retribution, yes, but also the Indian class system, the complications that come with having one true love in a culture where love is arranged for you based on a litany of factors, and familial politics. It’s more layered than any Wick-esque title has ever been. It also features plenty of broken bones and severed heads. However you meet Kill, its terms are etched in stone. That the stone is stained with blood is a beautiful, brutal bonus.
