Rating: ****
Review by Akshita Gupta
Neerja, as is known, is a biopic based on Neerja Bhanot (played By Sonam Kapoor) who was the head purser on the Pan Am flight from Mumbai to New York via Karachi and Frankfurt. The film is about the hijack of Pan Am flight 73 that took place on 5th September 1986.
The film starts with a closer look into Neerja’s life, her real character that of an ordinary girl with wonderful relationships with people in her life.
She is the apple of her father’s eye, the center of her mother’s universe as well as the darling younger sister of two brothers. The film then goes on to depict the incidents of “the day”, from the time Neerja gets ready for the flight till the end of the dreaded incident.
Even though the film is based on the hijacking that took place, it is much more than just that. The heart of the film lies in the mother-daughter relationship. The story goes beyond the incidents of just that day and gives further insight into Neerja’s life before the hijacking – her values, her rocky past and the beautiful relationships she had with the various people in her life. The story moves back and forth in time to depict these past incidents from her life to the time of the hijack which prevents the film from being monotone and provides an interesting change in storytelling and cinematography if not its pace.
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