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‘Tejas’ Review: It’s Hard to Believe An Air Combat Thriller Can Be Such a Fairy Tale

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When in doubt, suppose about the country – that is the mantra that Tejas, written and directed by means of Sarvesh Mewara and produced by means of Ronnie Screwvala’s RSVP Movies, harps upon. This is a movie that religiously adheres to that axiom. It is usually in doubt and it in no way lets the state slip out of its thoughts.

But attempt as tough as it may, Tejas comes a entire cropper – it is a dead-on-arrival cinematic consignment that does no justice at all to the nation, the Air Force or the medium. It is an insufferably bland thriller that believes that peddling patriotism can assist it paper over its pockmarks.

Toplined with the aid of a definitely out of her depth Kangana Ranaut in the function of an Indian Air Force pilot who flourishes on hazardous missions and empty platitudes, Tejas is a precariously low-flying car that by no means gathers any velocity. It lurches from one crashlanding to another.

It have to have taken some doing for the makers to turn an aviation actioner into such a stilted, insipid affair. The excruciatingly vacuous writing – the strains that the characters spout are proper out of a how-real-people-should-not-speak handbook, is aggravated manifold by means of the terribly sloppy performing all around.

Ranaut’s eponymous persona is a ‘rockstar’ in the guise of a fighter pilot who flies the single-engine mild fight plane that shares her name. Well, well, Tejas piloting a Tejas in a mission known as Tejas in a movie titled Tejas – how dramatic!

The movie has a scene in which the attraction of a popstar (Varun Mitra, who suggests up for a bit, is projected as the heroine’s romantic activity and then is viewed no extra due to the fact the female he desires to woo has a long way extra vital matters on her mind) is eclipsed by using the air of mystery that surrounds Wing Commander Tejas Gill (Ranaut). She is mobbed through autograph-hunting ladies who seem proper thru the preening crooner.

That, in a metafictional sense, is the sort of movie Tejas is. Nobody is allowed to steal the heroine’s thunder here. This is a Kangana Ranaut exhibit all the way and that is the film’s largest undoing. There isn’t always a single fleeting second – forget about an complete sequence – in Tejas in which the lead performer is convincing.

Ranaut used to be infinitely higher as Rani Lakshmibai (in Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi) than she is as an intrepid Air Force pilot. That, as is obvious, is pronouncing a lot. The persona she plays, all spunk and no substance, has a single dimension. She is aware of no doubts.

From her days in the Air Force academy to the volatile mission she undertakes in order to store an Indian undercover agent held hostage in Mir Ali city in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Tejas Gill is a fount of special Genius and unshakeable confidence. So, the personality has no arc to talk of. She starts the place she ends.

Tejas Gill’s supportive mother and father pop up in a few scenes however the two-hour movie has no house for the story of the protagonist’s developing up years. This ain’t no Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl. All that Tejas lets on is that the female made up her thinking about turning into a fighter pilot when Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee named India’s fighter plane Tejas.

The female-led movie touches upon the gender theme all right, however solely cursorily. The guys take a backseat as two ladies lead the cost in the climactic sequences. That is the factor that the movie tries to make with all its may however muffs up its lines.

Tejas plunges straight into a sortie that Tejas makes in the corporation of Afiya (Anshul Chauhan, the solely member of the solid who comes somewhere making an impression) to rescue an Air Force officer whose airplane has crashed in the sea and his physique has washed up on a prohibited island inhabited by way of the covered Sentinelese tribe.

Tejas refuses to again off notwithstanding orders from higher-ups and pulls off a daring rescue act, shaking off an assault with the aid of the tribals in the process. She is struck by means of arrows. But that is no extra than a expert hazard that is shrugged off except a good deal ado.

For their daring and selfless effort, she and Afiya – the title would possibly ring a bell however her non secular identification is fiercely guarded – face an inner inquiry. But considering that it is Kangana Ranaut who is in the line of fire, you comprehend that she is going to sail via unscathed.

Yes, that is the stage at which Tejas flies. Such are the flights of fancy that the exasperatingly listless movie indulges in that barely 30 minutes in, it turns into a bit of a slog that is difficult to take a seat through. Somebody says, Hum uddte uddte jaayenge, desh ke kaam aayenge. The protagonist takes that to heart. There is no stopping her from right here on.

As Tejas sits at the controls of her first solo trial sortie, the trainer asks her what she can see. The runway, she replies. Look harder, the man says. The woman pauses and pipes up: I can see the street that will assist me serve the nation. Spot on! She is geared up for greater things.

The film, unfortunately, by no means is. It crams in the whole lot that you would anticipate from a drama of this nature. In 2008 Mumbai, terrorists interrupt a satisfied household dinner. A shrieking, smirking mastermind harboured by means of Pakistan wishes to make sure the barbadi of Hindustan.

Also appear out for a ferocious executioner nicknamed Sar Qalam (meaning the act of decapitation) due to the fact of his talent at slitting the throats of hostages. But now not to worry, the enemy troopers that the protagonist has to deal with are a bunch of bumbling, easy-to-hoodwink men.

And for properly measure, there is a spanking new temple that faces the risk of an assault from three jihadists who sneak in to sabotage the inauguration of the grand edifice.

Logic is misplaced in the deafening din of the fight aircraft. Tejas is a movie that flies into hard climate from the phrase go and by no means manages to locate a way out of it. An air fight thriller has in no way been so frustratingly airy-fairy.

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Wicked Box Office Hits Global Milestone, Poised to Surpass Kung Fu Panda 4 and Godzilla x Kong

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The box office for Wicked hits a significant milestone worldwide as it gets ready to surpass Godzilla x Kong and Kung Fu Panda 4.

Wicked is still doing well despite recent box office releases that have caused significant disappointment. The most recent Wizard of Oz musical was too good for the Spider-Man villain and the Tolkien adaption to compete with Kraven the Hunter and The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim in the same week. Wicked has already exceeded its $145 million budget following a record-breaking first weekend that raked in over $160 million globally.

It has achieved even more success this past weekend. Variety said that after making $359 million domestically, the musical adaption made over $524 million internationally. It is currently on track to surpass Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire and Kung Fu Panda 4, which brought in $547.6 million and $571.1 million, respectively. Having significantly outperformed Grease’s $188.62 million total, it is also officially the highest-grossing Broadway adaption in domestic box office history.

What the Box Office Success of Wicked Means

Musicals and animated blockbusters are regaining their position at the box office after ten years of action film supremacy. Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4 have taken first and third place for the entire year, while Moana 2 and Wicked are the top films this weekend. With a $1.3 billion box office total, Deadpool & Wolverine is still in second place, but it’s probably the only action film to stay in the top five globally. Dune: Part Two may lose its position when Mufasa: The Lion King is released the following week:

TitleDomesticWorldwide
Inside Out 2
$653 million$1.7 billion
Deadpool & Wolverine
$637 million$1.3 billion
Despicable Me 4
$360 million
$970 million
Moana 2
$338 million$717 million
Dune: Part Two
$282 million
$714 million

This pattern is probably due to the fact that, other from Deadpool & Wolverine, neither DC nor Marvel have released any successful films this year. With Joker: Folie à Deux, DC tried to duplicate its $1 billion triumph, but it only made $200 million globally. With the exception of Wicked, every film in the top 10 global releases for 2024 has been a sequel, creating a distinct market. Based on a Broadway musical and The Wizard of Oz, Wicked is not a completely original film, but its box office performance does demonstrate that non-sequels may be successful in theaters in today IP-driven landscape.

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Danny Ramirez on Joaquin Phoenix Leaving the Gay Romance Film Directed by Todd Haynes

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Todd Haynes was planning to cast Danny Ramirez and Joaquin Phoenix in a gay romance movie. However, Phoenix left the untitled production five days before Guadalajara, Mexico, filming got underway.

At the Academy Museum Gala on Saturday night in Los Angeles, Ramirez told Variety’s Marc Malkin, “It’s definitely disappointing.” “If anything,” he continued, “If anything, it just gave me more inspiration to keep driving, keep pushing, and knowing that I’m on the right path and approaching the work the right way. So that’s what I’m excited about.”

The movie, which depended on Phoenix’s casting, was in danger after it was revealed in August that he had quit the production, according to sources. Two guys in love in the 1930s who escape Los Angeles and travel to Mexico were the main subject of the NC-17-rated movie.

“It’s definitely a very complicated situation,” Ramirez stated. “The audition process was extensive, and so what I walked away with that was just the artistic validation of throwing down opposite of [Phoenix] in this chemistry read… There was a moment that I was like, ‘Oh, I’ve arrived as a performer.’”

“The most recent update is ‘hopefully.’” Ramirez said in response to a question about whether the movie is still in development with filmmaker Haynes.

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David Schwimmer Remembers Rejecting “Men in Black”: ‘That Would Have Made Me a Hollywood Star’

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Although David Schwimmer admits his “career would have taken a very different trajectory” if he had been the lead in the 1997 movie, he doesn’t regret declining Men in Black.

The actor said, “That’s not why I turned it down,” in response to a question on a recent episode of the podcast Origins With Cush Jumbo regarding whether he rejected down the successful franchise because it conflicted with his Friends filming schedule. Rather, he decided to become a feature film director.

Schwimmer said, “[It] was a brutal decision.” the actor chuckles. “I had just finished filming The Pallbearer, my first film with Gwyneth Paltrow, and there were high expectations of that, which didn’t come true (Laughs). It was kind of a bomb, but there were high expectations, and the studio, which was Miramax, wanted to lock me into a three-picture deal at a fixed price, and I said I would do that if I got to direct my first movie.”

After months of talks, the intelligence actor said that they had come to an agreement whereby he “would act in three more movies for them” in exchange for allowing him to “direct my entire theater company in the first film,” Since You’ve Been Gone from 1998. The film was told through the perspective of a doctor who was severely beaten up by a fellow graduate on graduation day, humiliating him and setting the stage for a ten-year class reunion.

“All these unknown actors but I was going to put them on the map, basically. I was going to let everyone discover the talent of this amazing company,” Schwimmer said, “We found this amazing script, and we were developing it. We started pre-production. All my best friends in the world in my theater company quit their jobs so they could be in this film over the summer, which was going to be a six-week shoot in Chicago.”

However, Schwimmer had to make a tough decision about his career because the production for his directing debut happened to coincide with the filming of Men in Black.

The Six Days Seven Nights actor recalls, “We’re in pre-production, hired the whole crew, everything’s going and that’s when I was offered Men in Black.” “It was a direct conflict with this. My summer window from Friends was four months. I had a four-month hiatus and Men in Black was going to shoot exactly when I was going to direct this film with my company. And of course, it was an amazing opportunity. However, my theater company and that relationship with all those people would probably have ended. I don’t think it would have recovered.”

Schwimmer stated that he is unsure if “he made the right choice,” but he firmly feels that in these kinds of circumstances “you have to follow your gut, you have to follow your heart.”

“Look, I’m really aware, whatever 20 years later maybe more, [Men in Black] would have made me a movie star,” he continued. “If you look at the success of that film and that franchise, my career would have taken a very different trajectory.”

In the end, Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith played the key parts in the Men in Black franchise.

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