BOTTOM LINE
Classy, Emotional Aerial Combat Drama
PLATFORM
Netflix
RUNTIME
5 Hours (Episodes)
What Is the Show About?
In 1999, Indian Air Force pilots, under the leadership of Wing Commander B S Dhanoa, are deployed to support ground troops during the Kargil War. With enemy bunkers perched on peaks at 18,000 feet, pilots including Squadron Leader Ajay Ahuja have to deal with the limitations of high-altitude combat and orders that do not permit them to cross the Line of Control. How do they adapt to these constraints and secure a victory?
Performances
Siddharth sets the tone for the show as Squadron Leader Ajay Ahuja. He looks dapper in uniform, brings gravitas to his performance, laced with wit and empathy, and also shows why Ahuja is quite the boss at work. Manu Rishi Chadha’s portrayal of the doggedly ambitious Pervez Musharraf is well worth the hype. The performance gives you a fair idea of the political tactician he went on to become.
Jimmy Shergill, as B S Dhanoa, also called Tony, serves as the ideal emotional anchor for the story, remaining empathetic towards his colleagues and focused on his work while confronting guilt himself. The other seniors in the mix, including Vinay Pathak, Adil Hussain and Aanjjan Srivastav, are aptly cast for their parts. Abhay Verma, Taaruk Raina and Mihir Ahuja deliver vibrant and equally vulnerable performances as the young pilots.
Amrita Bagchi is the most impressive among the women in the show, getting an arc of her own that showcases her resilience. Prajakta Koli and Dia Mirza are not left with much to do.
Analysis
What Top Gun: Maverick has done for Indian cinema is lend a visual grammar to the portrayal of aerial combat on screen. In terms of action, strategy and storytelling, it has provided a benchmark that several filmmakers have tried to emulate, though with little success. Fighter is probably the closest our industry has come to cracking the code, while Sky Force and Operation Valentine fell well short.
However, Netflix‘s six-episode series Operation Safed Sagar, which sheds light on the Indian Air Force’s contribution during the 1999 Kargil War, is a worthy attempt to set the record straight. The narrative comes with a strong emotional context around the officers associated with the operation, while providing a fair idea of the political drama that triggered the war.
A commendable aspect is the decision to present this as a linear narrative, helping the action, tension and anxiety feel instinctive, without treating it as a glorious episode set in the past. While in Pakistan, the President and the Army Chief are at loggerheads over their decisions in a nervy political phase, Squadron Leader Ajay Ahuja in India is gearing up a bunch of young pilots to be war-ready.
If Ahuja is the Top Gun equivalent of this show, the pilots training under him fit familiar archetypes. Dhaliwal is the show-off with an adventurous streak, Bal Reddy, called Baldy, is the officer whose emotions get the better of him, and several trainees cannot get along with each other until Ahuja uses typical team-building activities to bring them together.
Air Marshal Vinod Patney and Wing Commander B S Dhanoa take the major decisions, while Ahuja and his team execute them. Their wives back home forge a close sisterhood, ensuring the men’s spirits stay intact before a sortie. As the situation eases and the officers return, they remain the same partners who make a list of issues they need to sort out on a piece of paper.
What really clicks for Operation Safed Sagar is the cooling-off phase before the war. The little details, routines and personality traits are sketched out smoothly, without hurry. For instance, as the young pilots land at Ahuja’s home one night after a rough day of training, his wife Alka gives each of them a vegetable to cut, and the tensions within the group are eased naturally.
Even when the war begins, the show wins your trust with its authenticity. Smart narrative techniques are in place to give you an understanding of what affects a pilot’s psyche in crunch situations and how proactive and aware one has to be to respond to danger. At all times, the storytelling remains quite accessible, without dumbing down the jargon or the intricacies of aerial combat.
It has all the familiar beats of a war narrative: the training phase, a sudden declaration of war, unexpected setbacks, deaths, dealing with guilt and loss, and ensuring that they do not lose sight of the larger goal. In the latter half, Operation Safed Sagar briefly slips while oversimplifying Pakistan’s political instability and diplomatic stance, making the mission feel like an act of revenge.
Apart from these minor issues, which are anyway hard to avoid in a mainstream narrative based on true events, Operation Safed Sagar stays with you for the right reasons. You remember it for the adrenaline rush, the heroics of the pilots giving it their all in the war, their brotherhood, the anxiety around their return, the lives that were lost and the final goodbyes that never happened.
Operation Safed Sagar is a sharp, engaging aviation drama, grounded by a straightforward narrative and assured performances, resisting a hyper-nationalistic take on the 1999 Kargil War. It is just the kind of show that brings respectability to long-form storytelling on OTT platforms.
Music and Other Departments?
Anurag Saikia’s score comes with obvious limitations in a war narrative, though he navigates them well without making the show a cliché. The cinematography by Setu, with a relatively muted colour palette using pastels, works for the show, ably backed by neat graphics, VFX elements and extensions. A certain complacency is noticeable in the later parts of the show, both in the writing and the political positioning. Despite the runtime stretching to nearly six hours, you do not feel fatigued.
Highlights?
* Classy execution, accessible storytelling
* Good, measured performances
* The right blend of emotion and action, avoiding jingoism
Drawbacks?
* Slightly shaky in the last set of episodes
* Hard to ignore the Top Gun influence
Did I Enjoy It?
Yes, it treats the subject with respect while also entertaining.
Will You Recommend It?
If you have a taste for war or aerial combat dramas, you will not be disappointed.
Operation Safed Sagar Web Series Reviewed by M9 News
