Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty

Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	A. R. Murugadoss
Produced by	Aruna Bhatia Twinkle Khanna Vipul Amrutlal Shah
Written by	A. R. Murugadoss
Based on	Thuppakki by A. R. Murugadoss
Starring	Akshay Kumar Sonakshi Sinha Sumeet Raghavan Freddy Daruwala
Music by	Songs: Pritam Background Score: Prasad Sashte
Cinematography	Natarajan Subramaniam
Edited by	Amitabh Shukla
Production company	Hari Om Entertainment Sunshine Pictures
Distributed by	Reliance Entertainment
Release date	6 June 2014 (2014-06-06)
Running time	170 minutes[1]
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Budget	₹86 crore[1]
Box office	₹176 crore[1]

Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty is a 2014 Indian action thriller film written and directed by A. R. Murugadoss, and produced by Vipul Shah. It features Akshay Kumar and Sonakshi Sinha in the lead roles, along with Farhad as the antagonist in his Bollywood debut and Govinda in a special appearance. It is a remake of Murugadoss' own acclaimed Tamil film Thuppakki (2012).^[2] The film released on 6 June 2014,^[3] becoming the biggest net grosser of the first half of 2014.^[4][5] The movie was also reported to be one of the best thrillers to come out of Bollywood.^[6] Akshay Kumar was nominated for Filmfare Award for Best Actor at 60th Filmfare Awards.

Plot

Virat Bakshi (Akshay Kumar), Captain in D.I.A., a secret wing of Indian Army, returns to his home in Mumbai on a holiday. On his arrival, his parents rush him to see Saiba Thapar (Sonakshi Sinha), who they wanted him to marry. But Virat rejects her with an excuse that she is old fashioned and not his type. On the contrary, Saiba is a professional boxer, and is completely modern in her outlook. Virat notices her in a boxing match and falls in love with her instantly.

One day, while traveling in a bus with his friend sub-inspector Mukund "Makhiya" Deshmukh (Sumeet Raghavan), Virat, while chasing a man who he regards with suspicion when he tries to flee the scene of a check going on after a passenger reports his wallet as stolen, witnesses a bomb explosion killing innocent people. Virat manages to capture the man who planted the bomb but he escapes from the hospital with the help of a police officer. Virat kidnaps the terrorist again, tortures him to ascertain the name of the police officer and also forces corrupt police officer Ashok Gaikwad (Gireesh Sahedev) to commit suicide. He later discovers that a terrorist group has planned serial blasts in Mumbai to be executed in a couple of days with the help of 12 sleeper agents. Virat remembers that on the day when the bombs are going to be planted, there is a wedding where his team member Joel is tying the knot and all his Army officer friends are going to assemble. Along with his fellow Army officers and Mukund, Virat manages to track these bombers and kills them before they could trigger the bombs.

When the leader of these sleeper cells (Freddy Daruwala) finds out about the team of officers involved in the failure of the terrorist attack, he goes to Joel's house and kills his family and finds an album which has photos of team officers. He targets one officer's female relative from each team and kidnapes them. When Virat realizes the plan, he substitutes one of the girls to be kidnapped, with his younger sister Priti (Cherry Mardia). Using his pet dog Rocky and his sister's dupatta, he manages to reach the terrorist's hideout. He eliminates all the terrorists and rescues all the victims including his sister, who was about to be killed after Virat's bluff was exposed. Virat also captures Asif Ali (Dipendra Sharma), who was the leader of the group but later kills him on realizing that Asif is just the second-in-command of the sleeper cells.

When this attack fails, the terrorist leader decides to target Virat himself. He kills Kapil and his family, he being one of the army officers and forces Virat to surrender. Virat decides to sacrifice his life and plans a suicide attack by instructing Mukund and his fellow officers to follow him via a tracking chip inserted in his arm and plant a bomb at the terrorist's hideout. Virat then drives to a port in various cars, as instructed by the leader and ends up on a ship full of terrorists. To his shock, Virat finds out that the cars he was asked to drive had bombs in them, which will frame him and his team as terrorists and also boost their plans to recruit sleeper cells in Indian Army with the help of Joint Defense Secretary of India — Mr. Alvin D'souza (Zakir Hussain), who is also a member of this terrorist group. Meanwhile, Joel, who was in touch with Mukund as instructed by Virat, plants a bomb at the base of the ship. Virat has a one-on-one fight with the leader and escapes on a boat before the ship explodes, also later killing the leader. The film ends with Virat forcing Alvin D'souza to commit suicide and later returning to guard the border along with his team.

Cast

• Akshay Kumar as Virat Bakshi, Captain in D.I.A., a wing of Indian Army, and a soldier.^[7]
• Sonakshi Sinha as Saiba Thapar, a boxer.^[8]
• Freddy Daruwala as Shadab Ali, the leader of the sleeper cells.^[9]
• Sumeet Raghavan as Mukund 'Makhiya' Deshmukh, Virat's friend, also a Sub Inspector, Mumbai Police.
• Govinda as Pratap, Virat Bakshi's Senior Commanding Officer (Cameo Appearance).
• Zakir Hussain as Alvin D'souza, Joint Secretary of Defense.
• Gireesh Sahedev^[7] in a cameo appearance as ACP Ashok Gaikwad.
• Dipendra Sharma in a cameo appearance as Asif Ali, the second-in-command of the sleeper cells.
• Maroof Raza in a special appearance.
• Cherry Mardia as Preeti Bakshi, Virat Bakshi's sister
• Apoorva Arora as Akshay Kumar's little sister
• Prayas Mann as Aasif Ali, Shadab's brother

Production

The film's production commenced in 2013 with the working title of Pistol under the banner of Hari Om Entertainment and Sunshine Pictures. The songs are composed by Pritam Chakraborty, while the background score is composed by Prasad Sashte. The stunt coordinator of the film is Greg Powell.^[10]

The production budget of Holiday is around ₹30 crore (US$4.7 million) without Akshay Kumar remuneration, print and advertising costs.^[11] According to director A. R. Murugadoss, Akshay's role is that of an Army officer for which Akshay lost some weight to fit in the role and to look 12 years younger from his real biological age. Kumar also sported a crew-cut hairstyle for his role.^[12] Whilst Sonakshi will play a role of boxer and Virat (Kumar's) love interest Saiba.^[8] Model and debutant Freddy Daruwala will play the main antagonist pitted against Kumar.^[9]

The film was originally scheduled for a release in early May 2014, which would have clashed with the release of Action Jackson.^[13] However, Action Jackson released on 5 December 2014, while Holiday released on 6 June 2014.

Music

The songs featured in the film were composed by Pritam. Additional songs featured in the audio CD were composed by Kaushik Dutta. The lyrics were written by Irshad Kamil for the songs featured in the film. Sukumar Dutta wrote the lyrics for Kaushik Dutta's compositions which were featured in the audio cd only.

Prasad Sashte composed the background score of the movie.

A reprise version of the song Ashq Na Ho was released by Zee Music on 17 March 2016. The Reprise version was sung by singer Asees Kaur.

Track listing

Critical reception

The movie has received positive reviews from the critics. ABP News similarly rated it 4.5/5,calling it a"fast paced,exhilarating roller coaster ride"^[14] Taran Adarsh gave 4/5 and states that it is a slick action-thriller that keeps you engrossed, enthralled and captivated all through, thanks to its fascinating premise and a watertight, razor-sharp screenplay.^[15]
The Times Of India gave the movie 3.5 rating describing it as This one applauds the jawans who live in the jaws of death, and is a 'wake up' call for all the 'sleepers' that abound. Bravo!"" ^[16] Rachel Saltz of The New York Times stated that "The action sequences mostly have tension and punch, even if the movie is old-school long — 2 hours 41 minutes — and the plot doesn’t bear too much scrutiny".^[17] The romantic angle of the movie was criticised.^[18] Hindustan Times praised the performance of Akshay Kumar.^[19] Filmfare critic praised the movie as, "Genuinely smart action thriller" ^[20]

References

External links

• Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty on IMDb