Highly fictional & melodramatic depiction of a true story.

Rating: 5/10 (25 January 2016)

When you say a movie is based on true events, you expect it to be at least 80-90% authentic if not 100%. But with Airlift we get a highly fictionalized & over-dramatic depiction of events based in background of true events where around 1.7 lacs Indian civilians were evacuated from Kuwait during Gulf War. Our main protagonist Ranjit Katiyal (Akshay Kumar) itself is a fictional character who is said to be churned out of 3 real people. The film largely undermines the combined efforts of then Ministry of External Affairs & Air India which played significant role in one of the largest evacuation from war zone. Instead it highlights our protagonist & another fictional bureaucrat as the MVPs. There are some parts where you'll ask yourself, did this really happen!?. Like for instance, when Ranjit fights with a bunch of Iraqi soldiers to protect a Kuwaiti woman & child risking lives of 1.7 lac Indians, & after being beaten those soldiers don't even inform their counterparts or call for back up. The pace of the film is slow & the needless songs drags it further. Akshay Kumar & Nimrat Kaur have acted well &other supporting cast have done a decent job. Eventually it becomes another melodramatic Bollywood film where fiction is sold as a true story to touch the patriotic nerve of Indians right around India's Republic Day.