Bang Bang!


Bang Bang! is a 2014 Indian Hindi-language action drama film directed by Siddharth Anand and produced by Fox Star Studios, based on an adapted screenplay by Sujoy Ghosh and Suresh Nair. A remake of the 2010 American film Knight and Day by James Mangold starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, it stars Hrithik Roshan, Katrina Kaif and Danny Denzongpa., while the dialogues in the film are written by Abbas Tyrewala.
Made on a total unprecedented budget of, Bang Bang! was released in conventional and IMAX theatres on 2 October 2014, coinciding with Gandhi Jayanti. Also released simultaneously in Tamil and Telugu languages, the film was praised for its action sequences and grossed – in its worldwide cinema run.

Plot

Somewhere in London, Colonel Viren Nanda goes to meet a wanted terrorist Omar Zafar in his holding cell. As Viren informs Zafar that he will be extradited back to India for his crimes, Zafar's men enter his holding cell, led by Hamid Gul, killing all guards around them, with Zafar then killing Viren by shooting him and then burning him. As Zafar escapes, he puts a $5 million rewards for someone to steal the Koh-i-Noor diamond from the Tower of London, but with one condition that the thief must be Indian, to hold up a new extradition treaty between India and the UK. Soon after, a man named Rajveer Nanda steals it, and when Zafar's men, led by Shoaib Hakhsar are informed of the theft, they travel to Rajveer for the deal. Rajveer informs them that he wants $20 million for the deal, then a fight breaks out between them. After Rajveer escapes, he sees a young lady, Harleen Sahni sitting in a restaurant, who is there waiting for her internet date, "Vickie Kapoor", to show up. Rajveer enters the restaurant posing as "Vickie" and woos her over. He convinces Harleen to use the bathroom and fights the remaining men who came searching for him. Harleen, upon learning the truth as she comes out, returns in fury, but soon bumps into Rajveer, who reveals his identity, again. When he manages to perform an impromptu surgery on himself with Harleen's help, he drugs her, telling her that government officials will come looking for her as they have spotted them together, and he dictates Harleen on what she must do when being escorted by them.
The next day, indeed as Rajveer had told her, government agent Zorawar Kalra and his informer, Inspector Bhola, visit Harleen at her working bank office and threaten her to come with them. In the car, Zorawar tells her that they are not going to the station but they are taking her to a safe place instead. Taking cues from what Rajveer had instructed her to do, she finds a pistol and holds Bhola at gunpoint. At the same time, Rajveer appears on a bike, and both Rajveer and Harleen find a car and escape. When Rajveer goes out to shoot the goons, Harleen tries to escape from Rajveer when she bumps into her manager, Karan Saxena, who is tracked down by Rajveer is shot by him in the leg when he tries to defend Harleen. Shortly after they escape in Karan's car, Harleen gets into an argument when she teels Rajveer that she wants to go home and that she had made a huge mistake by trusting him. Rajveer angrily tells her that he has no other motive than protecting her. She feels guilty and decides to stick to him. While Rajveer checks a location on his phone which Harleen notices, he tells her that he has never allowed any innocent person to die at all. During a mid-route halt at a Pizza Hut outlet, Harleen asks him about the crime that he has committed and Rajveer shows her the Koh-i-Noor much to her surprise. Soon they realise that they were followed by Zorawar and his team who convince Harleen to go with them. Rajveer, however, shoots her with a tranquilizer dart and they both jump out of a window and escape. She wakes up at a beach shack wearing a bikini top and shorts. She angrily asks Rajveer as to who changed her clothes and he confesses that he did it. She beats him and then takes Rajveer's phone to call her grandmother; unbeknownst to her, it allows the government officials to track their position and discover that they are on an island. After a shootout occurs between Rajveer and the government officials on the beach, he escapes with Harleen with help from a sea bob and a fly board.
Harleen wakes up the next morning in Prague. As Rajveer was able to successfully lead the escape of them both, Harleen now entrusts Rajveer, subsequently falling in love with him. When Rajveer goes out of his hotel with Harleen, he tracks Gul at a casino, visits him atop the terrace, and a fight ensues regarding the whereabouts of Zafar, wherein Rajveer ultimately kills Gul. In the meantime, Harleen spots Zorawar and is taken to the Indian Embassy in Prague, where Zorawar and Indian Intelligence Secret Services Chief Narayanan reveal to her that Rajveer actually came to Prague to find Gul, and Zorawar gives her a tracking device. Harleen is asked to get the Koh-i-Noor back. That night, Rajveer picks up Harleen at the entrance of a hotel where she says while walking on a bridge that the trust between them is broken, and that she knows about him. Rajveer activates the tracking device himself, allowing the officials to surround them. Rajveer gives the Koh-i-Noor to Harleen and jumps from the bridge, but is shot, and is assumed dead.
Harleen then returns home and found that she is missing Rajveer. She then remembers the address location that Rajveer was viewing on his phone. At the address, she meets Rajveer's father Pankaj and his mother Shikha. At the house, Harleen sees photos of Rajveer, when Shikha reveals that her sons Viren and Jaiwant "Jai" Nanda, the latter disguised as Rajveer, had been serving in the army. She goes on to explain that although it was confirmed that Viren was murdered, she almost claims that Jai died while on a mission when he drowned deep after being shot fatally, when Pankaj rises and negates the story the army told him, as he goes on to point Harleen to a trophy, explaining that the trophy was won by Jai, a swimming champion in his youth, as he was the only student who was able to cross the lake in only one breath. On her way home, Harleen is kidnapped by someone and next lands up in a fortress, where she meets Zafar, who learns and reveals that the diamond was a fake. Zorawar is then revealed to be Zafar's right-hand man, and gives Harleen a truth serum drug to reveal the location of the real diamond. Harleen, realizing that her intuitions about him are correct, deduces that Rajveer has survived and is coming to kill Zafar.
In the meantime, it is shown that Rajveer has survived, and he then silently kills every guard posted outside and places time bombs in every corner and enters the room. Zafar then orders his men to beat Rajveer, but before Zafar is able to kill him, Rajveer informs that the Koh-i-Noor was not stolen at all and it was a joint operation between the MI6 and the Indian Secret Service to get Zafar. The time bombs go off and destroy the castle, but Zafar manages to escape and captures Harleen again. As they escape with her in flight,Rajveer get into that flight and kills all of them on board then frees Harleen, while destroying the flight and throwing Zafar into the fire after a brief struggle. When they are escaping from the aircraft, Zafar emerges again and shoots Rajveer. Jaiwant pushes Harleen out of the aircraft and grabs the axe and charges towards Zafar and kills him. When the aircraft is about to explode, he jumps out, loses consciousness, and is about to drown when Harleen grabs his hand, and the authorities airlift them both.
Jaiwant then wakes up in hospital, where Narayanan, now revealed to be his commandant, is sitting across him and congratulates him for successfully completing the mission. He rues about the fact that Viren was murdered and that their parents will never get to see him again. Also, he informs Rajveer that Harleen has been sent back to her home and he will be shifted to a safe facility the next day. After Narayanan leaves, a nurse arrives and gives Jaiwant a medicine to drink. He feels giddy and asks the nurse about it. The nurse turns around and removes her mask revealing that she is actually Harleen and the medicine was a sedative meant to knock Jaiwant out. Jaiwant faints and Harleen escapes from the hospital along with him. He wakes up and realises that she has brought him to his house. He silently thanks her, and they both reunite with Pankaj and Shikha.

Cast

Casting

Earlier reports had suggested that Siddharth Anand, who had made Salaam Namaste, Ta Ra Rum Pum, Bachna Ae Haseeno and Anjaana Anjaani in the past, planned to make his next film with Shahid Kapoor, but Kapoor wanted to avoid comparisons with Hollywood star Tom Cruise and also had no dates for the film as he had opted Haider already. Bipasha Basu rumouredly was also on board but turned down. Soon news came that Anand was planning a film with Hrithik Roshan. In September 2012, Roshan was confirmed to play the lead role, with Katrina Kaif confirmed to play the female lead in the film. Roshan started working on the film immediately after wrapping up Krrish 3, and charged a fee for his performance in the film, which until then was the most any actor in Bollywood had charged up front. The film was soon revealed to be the official Bollywood remake of Knight and Day, starring Cruise and Cameron Diaz.

Filming

In December 2012, it was confirmed that the official remake of Knight and Day would be titled Bang Bang. In March 2013, the film's Kashmir schedule was cancelled. Shooting for the film began on 1 May 2013, with the film scheduled for release on 1 May 2014. Unique water action sequences were shot in Thailand and Greece. In an interview with Mumbai Mirror, Roshan spoke about the action sequences in the film stating, "I have pushed myself to the extreme for this stunt. This sequence called for mental and physical tenacity. The rush that I experienced while training and executing the sequence was out of the world. I was hooked to a sea plane while I did the stunt. I had trained non-stop to even attempt the sequence". Roshan refused to use any body double to perform the stunts.
Talking about another water action sequences, the film's director Siddharth Anand revealed, "We can control the action we shoot on land, but while shooting at sea, you're at the mercy of the tide. Three days before the shoot, Hrithik started practicing the stunts for five-six hours daily. It took us eight days to shoot the sequences in water. For another water action sequence, Hrithik trained for four days, before the shooting. He learnt to jetski with a speed boat pulling him along first. Then, an antiquated plane was brought in with an experienced pilot at the controls, so that it could be slowed down and speeded up at will."
In July 2013, one of the songs of the film, "Meherbaan" was shot in the city of Santorini in Greece and choreographed by Ahmed Khan. In Phuket, Roshan performed a stunt where he had to use a water jetpack called a Flyboard and go 45 feet high in the sky and then dive down in the water. Roshan thus became the first actor in Hollywood or Bollywood to do a flyboarding stunt in a film. He was injured during this schedule and subsequently had to undergo a brain surgery for removal of a blood clot from his brain. Also, the Kashmir schedule of the film was delayed because of unrest in the valley.
The delays caused the film's release date to be postponed to 2 October 2014. There were reports that the film had overshot its budget to from a planned budget of around 80–90 crore. Anand denied such reports, saying "It's funny! Yes, Bang Bang! is a big-ticket film but its budget is as per the scale of the film. There's no question of exceeding it." The shooting resumed in January 2014, in Shimla, Manali, Mumbai, Abu Dhabi, Delhi and Prague. The shooting schedule in Shimla went on for straight six weeks. The Manali bridge where the majority of scenes were shot, has become a grand tourist attraction and it was renamed as Bang Bang Point. Just before the Abu Dhabi segment of the film, a song shoot was completed at an open-cafeteria in Film City, Mumbai on 19 April 2014. Shimla was created in Film City, Mumbai to shoot a song and few action sequences for the film. The film was shot for 20 days in Film City with the lead pair. After wrapping up the Mumbai schedule, the filming team left for Abu Dhabi.
The Abu Dhabi schedule of shooting was intense and action-packed. In Abu Dhabi, filming started early May, and took place at various locations in Abu Dhabi including the Corniche, Liwa oasis, Hyatt Capital Gate Hotel, Qasr al Sarab, Emirates Palace and Yas Island. In one of the chase sequences in the film, 120 cars were involved. The film also had used Formula 1 cars. Even after the brain surgery, all the stunts were performed by Roshan himself. The stunts were designed by Andy Armstrong and shot in Abu Dhabi. The Abu Dhabi segment of shooting was completed on 20 May in collaboration with twofour54. It is the first Bollywood film to be shot and co-produced in Abu Dhabi. The last leg of the film was scheduled in Prague. One stunt in which Roshan is on water skis while being pulled along by a sky plane was shot in a lake in Prague. He trained for four days to shoot this scene. Shooting wrapped on 15 July 2014.

Marketing

On the lines of the popular Ice Bucket Challenge – one of the biggest trends of the year, the dare on social media, Roshan came up with the dare-to-do game to Bollywood co-stars Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Nargis Fakhri, Sonam Kapoor, Ranveer Singh, Farhan Akhtar, Priyanka Chopra, Dino Morea, Uday Chopra and Dabboo Ratnani on Twitter asking them to post videos of themselves doing a particular task and adding the hashtag #bangbangdare to it. Roshan even dared the smokers asking them not to smoke for 3 days. One of the companies challenged Roshan himself, where he was asked to buy bed sheets from their store and if he did, ₹500,000 would be donated to city hospitals. He took up the dare sportingly. While most stars take to television shows to generate buzz about their films, Roshan refrained from promoting his movie through reality TV shows.
To protect the film from piracy, the makers of the film approached the Court of Piracy with the plea that the film should not be viewed on any device or broadcast on any platform through the Internet without their permission and submitted a list of 90 websites. The Court responded positively on that and restrained them all from making the film available on the Internet.

Soundtrack

The songs of the film were composed by Vishal-Shekhar, while the background score has been composed by Salim–Sulaiman. The digital album rights of the film were acquired by Zee Music Company.
The first look of the song "Tu Meri" was revealed on 20 August 2014 featuring Hrithik Roshan and Katrina Kaif. On 21 August 2014 video of the same song was released. The song was written and sung by Vishal Dadlani. Second song of the film "Meherbaan" featuring Hrithik Roshan and Katrina Kaif was released on 3 September 2014. This song was written by Anvita Dutt Guptan and sung by Ash King, Shilpa Rao and Shekhar Ravjiani. The teaser of the title song was released on 16 September 2014 featuring Hrithik Roshan and Katrina Kaif. On 17 September 2014 full video of the same song was released. The title track was written by Vishal Dadlani and sung by Benny Dayal and Neeti Mohan. It was choreographed by Bosco-Caesar. The song experience was "fun" for Hrithik, who said, "It's my ode to the inspiration he has been." While Katrina described her experience as "Dancing with Hrithik was the biggest challenge. His flexibility is incredible. It is at a different level altogether. You have to be really good to match up to his energy. He has natural energy when he dances. It comes to him so effortlessly". All the songs were well received by audience with the positive response.

Hindi (Original Soundtrack)

Telugu (Dubbed Version)

Tamil (Dubbed Version)

Critical reception

The film released worldwide on 2 October 2014.
Domestically, Bang Bang! received mixed reviews from critics. The film was praised for its action sequences and performances while it was criticised by some for its story and screenplay. Nandhini Srinivasan from FilmiBeat gave 3 out of 5 stars and recommended this total action-packed fun entertainer for the long weekend holiday.
Paloma Sharma from Rediff, giving 2.5/5 rating to the movie called it "A pointless official remake of an already bad original", while Raja Sen, again from Rediff, also gave 2/5 stars and wrote that the film is "a stupid, stupid film trying to be slick, a B-grade film made on an A-list budget.". Rajeev Masand on IBN Live gave the movie 2/5 stars commenting that the film then isn't unwatchable, but at 2 hours and 35 minutes, it certainly tests your patience.
The Indian Express rated it 1.5/5, calling Hrithik as "the eye candy of the film"

Box office

Worldwide, Bang Bang grossed , becoming one of the highest-grossing Bollywood films of 2014.

India

Bang Bang! had a theatrical run for 5 weeks with a final domestic nett of around. The Tamil and Telugu versions of the film grossed around nett.

Overseas

Bang Bang! earned $4.89 million overseas in its opening weekend. The biggest debut came from the UAE, North America, United Kingdom.
At the end of its theatrical run overseas, the film earned $13.97 million. The highest revenue came from Gulf, US/Canada, UK and Australia.

Awards and nominations