It’s not just an ambition that you witness in the starry eyes of a little girl who looks at an aeroplane and the view from up there in an awe. You witness the birth of a passion that stems out when it’s unhampered. It’s the true form of a burning desire, that’s constructed before it gets polluted by fear and apprehension. Janhvi Kapoor blends exceptionally well with the film’s compelling narrative. She poaches you incredibly. She echoes precisely what emotions you want to experience and also takes you by surprise through her performance. You share her enthusiasm, her passion and her journey along with her while she is soaring high against all the odds. And there is a beautifully conceived father – daughter bond between Pankaj Tripathi and Janhvi that tugs your heartstrings. It doesn’t just go mellow on you, it establishes a firm, strong foundation that makes Gunjan who she is. Pankaj as the father is remarkable. He not only just helps his daughter follow her dream, he shares her hardships. He goes above and beyond to keep his daughter’s dream alive while trying to protect her precious mind from self-doubting.
It calls for commendation when the film takes a refreshing narrative to tell the emergence of the unwritten patriarchy rules. And Gunjan never stops. She takes her seat that’s she rightfully hers in the male-dominated table. It’s inspiring, not just because of the gender discrimination battle she has to fight to prove herself, but the joy in her pursuit of her dream. She is in a soulful relationship with her dream. She tends to it, takes care of it and keeps it alive at any cost. She thinks of nothing but her yearning to fly high. She doesn’t doubt herself if it’s something she could pull off. The important take away is how Gunjan is kind to herself when she goes through all that struggle to prove her ability. She makes it literally her life’s mission to go after her dream. But the beauty is, the heaviness in her pursuit takes a form of joy instead of an exhaustion. That makes it infectious.
Gunjan just hangs in there when she is cornered. She doesn’t drop herself to the ground and injure her dream. She hovers and takes control of her life just how she handles her chopper. The film contains just the right amount of dramma and importantly it seizes the moving moments and you see them sunken in you too. Gunjan sculpts herself and happily does it. She challenges the hurdles that come in her way and answers them through her zeal. She embraces the hardships and is very sure of the excitement that awaits at the end of her pursuit. It’s not just her dream anymore, it becomes her. She calls herself a Tarzan and the joy in her eyes is the evidence you look for all of this. The struggles are no longer a pain to her but the salvation to find the purpose of her existence. You witness a physical form of passion. And that’s the extraordinary take away from Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl.
