Mission Majnu Review: Sidharth Malhotra’s Espionage Thriller is All Over the Place, Just Like His Character

Mission Majnu is a Hindi spy thriller film that stars Sidharth Malhotra as Amandeep Ajitpal Singh or Tariq Ali and Rashmika Mandanna as Nasreen. The film also stars Kumud Mishra, Parmeet Sethi, Sharib Hashmi, Rajit Kapur, Zakir Hussain and others. Directed by Shantanu Bagchi, the story is written by Aseem Arrora, Sumit Batheja and Parveez Shaikh. The cinematography is by Bijitesh De, and the music is by Ketan Sodha. It is produced by RSVP Movies and Guilty By Association Media LLP.

The runtime is of 129 minutes. The story is set post the Indo-Pakistan War of 1971.

Mission Majnu Movie Review Contains No Spoilers

Amandeep Ajitpal Singh is on an undercover mission in Pakistan and uses the name, Tariq. Tariq works at a tailor shop while keeping his eyes and ears open for suspicious moves. He is married to Nasreen, a visually impaired Pakistani woman. 

Tariq’s senior colleague from India informs him via phone that Pakistan is secretly trying to create nuclear weapons. Without getting caught, Tariq must find everything and report it back to India. The mission is very important for Tariq as a RAW agent because of the humiliation he has to face because of his father. We learn that Amandeep’s father betrayed RAW, and his son had to spend his life getting addressed as a traitor’s son.

The first half of Mission Majnu is an interesting build-up and peek into Tariq’s world. We see his love story and wedding with Nasreen in just one song. When he is assigned the big task of finding information, Tariq has to balance his married life, professional life, and secret life as an undercover agent. He listens intently to every piece of information and is dedicated to finding answers, despite all the insults his senior hurls at him on the phone.

While Tariq is busy digging for answers, the Pakistani government and army officers are setting up their nuclear weapons discreetly. I was curious to see how a simple tailor like him would manage to pull this off. However, the story becomes a big mess when two more agents join him. I would not name them to avoid any spoilers. To be honest, I was okay with Nasreen being written as a visually impaired woman. It made everything easy for Amandeep. But these three men would get away with anything and everything without facing big obstacles.

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What’s debatable is how they would easily phone back to India to inform their colleague about the developments in their mission. If Pakistan was busy making nuclear weapons by making sure no one was aware of it, why would they be so careless about phone calls? They, too, would’ve taken precautions to ensure their secret wasn’t out to anyone, especially India. Alia Bhatt showed better communication skills as Sehmat in Raazi, who used Morse code smartly in the bathroom of her in-laws’ mansion in Pakistan. Both films are set in the same era but in parallel timelines. 

The makers have claimed Netflix’s Mission Majnu is based on true events from 1974. But the premise reminded me a lot about Raazi, Gadar, and War, with a similar twist to something we saw in Tiger Zinda Hai. The film was earlier scheduled for release in theatres. So there’s an intermission block scene featuring Sidharth and Sharib and some gunshots. It is quite a silly scene, especially when Tariq is the movie’s protagonist. 

Mission Majnu took a convenient route many times for their characters/spies to get their work done. The only major challenge they faced was in the climax. Otherwise, the story seems like a child’s essay on “How to be an undercover spy for a mission,” where the twists and turns are always in favour of the protagonists. 

Sidharth Malhotra won millions of hearts with Shershaah, so the expectations with MM were quite high. The actor is dedicated to his character, which is dedicated to his mission and nation. But the weak script doesn’t give him much room to do something remarkable. Rashmika Mandanna was wasted as Nasreen, a one-dimensional character.

Mission Majnu Review: Final Thoughts

Overall, Sidharth’s latest movie lacks the spy thriller feel you expect from movies like these. It has a good first half, but the second half is all over the place, just like the undercover agents, especially Tariq.

The movie is now streaming on Netflix.

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