Major is a Telugu-language biopic on the life of Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, an Indian National Security Guard soldier who rescued civilians and courageously lost his life while helping hunt down the terrorists responsible for the Mumbai Terror Attacks in the Taj Hotel during November 2008. Watching this film was incredibly gratifying as it so deeply affirmed the resilience of human beings against terrifying adversity. There is no doubt that Maj Sandeep Unnikrishnan was a being unto his own, in a different league of existence that isn’t accessible to all humans. However, the success of Major comes from its skillful thematic distillation of Maj Unnikrishnan’s life to yield a handful of gripping life lessons that resonate for any individual, soldier or not. Rather than sensationalizing the horror of the Mumbai Attacks or getting lost in the rich, illustrious life of Maj Unnikrishnan, this film emerges as sum greater than its parts because of its dedication to intimately showcasing the innocence and compassion of his human soul. Major recognizes that while any length of screen time would be insufficient to even adequately, let alone comprehensively show thirty-one years of Maj Unnikrishnan’s life, maybe events are less important than feelings. This film reinforces the age-old pearl of wisdom that the journey is more important than the conclusion. It isn’t about how you die. It’s about how you live.

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Major begins with Maj Unnikrishnan’s famous last words, “Don’t come up. I’ll handle them,” and then cuts to an interview-style scene of his parents, played by Prakash Raj and Revathi. In these first few moments the two thematic pillars of Major are established: Sandeep’s innate sense of courage and his zeal for life. This identification of two of Unnikrishnan’ core personality traits from flashbacks to his childhood causes us as an audience to go from thinking of him stiffly as Major to affectionately calling him Sandeep or maybe even Sandy and realizing that he added value to the lives of others beyond solely what his profession called for. Before and while being a soldier he was also a son, a student, a friend, and a husband. In these initial moments of the film the thesis is immediately established, which is that Maj Unnikrishnan was his own person beyond a soldier or savior. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Owing to the overtly heroic nature of Maj Unnikrishnan’s actions in the Mumbai Attacks there was every possibility, especially in a ‘masala’ Indian film, for his identity to be reduced to the conventional stereotype of an ‘agyakari beta’. We’ve seen this protagonist in almost every Indian movie made about a soldier. A young, fit, good looking man whose parents dote on him and whose wife endlessly supports him. Now, this stereotype isn’t harmful because it’s unkind or untrue. This stereotype is harmful because it’s reductive - there is an individual waiting to be explored that’s beyond the stereotype. Not only would such a treatment have reduced the range of humanity of Major Unnikrishnan himself, it would also sanctify any scene he was in, making him an emotionally-inaccessible figure to audiences. Moreover, the title of ‘hero’ is so loaded with cinematic history that labeling Major Unnikrishnan simply as a hero would be a disservice to who he was. His heroism came from his vulnerability and resilience in the face of adversity. Not from his undefeatability or utter lack of moral fault in any domain of life.

 

The first thirty minutes of the film efficiently and painlessly give an overview of Sandeep’s childhood and adolescence. Not only does this segment of the film build an emotional connection between the audience and Sandeep, it also sets stakes and uses heavy foreshadowing to predict the kind of person Sandeep will grow into. His obsession with the military and police services uniform foreshadows his future ambitions to be a member of the national defense force. Sandeep’s innate sense of responsibility when witnessing wrongdoings in society, which was symbolized by his intervention in a situation of domestic violence, foreshadows his passion for public service and his genuine care for others, to the point of self-harm for the sake of others’ well-being. Even the turbulence in his marriage was foreshadowed when Isha sat Sandeep down and explained to him that while she admires his courage she can’t be with someone who can’t devote all of their time to her. All of these threads were carefully picked up and resolved in later acts of the film which made Sandeep’s character progression easily-identifiable and made the narrative that much more satisfying.

 

Something that I immediately noticed was the use of recurring dialogues and motifs, which made it easy to follow the themes of the narrative as the film progressed.
His mother’s jewelry pouch, the film camera, and the hand watch

that his father wears after Sandeep’s death were all examples of

props used as motifs. Segments of the soundtrack were also

repeated and assigned to each character, which acted as cues

that signaled which character was being referred to without

dialogue. Moreover, specific dialogues were also repeated but

metamorphosed in meaning as Sandeep’s story progressed.

One pertinent example of this is ‘Kaapadukovaalugaa (I have to keep you safe)’, which was first said by Isha playfully when she danced with Sandeep at the school farewell as a way to covertly admit her romantic feelings for him. The same dialogue was later repeated, now by Sandeep to Isha, at the bus station as a precursor to him professing love for her. But later on, this dialogue takes on weight when Sandeep says it to Isha on the phone to convince her against a divorce and she, for the first time, questions it by asking how someone can protect her when they’re not physically present with her. Ultimately this idelogic question was shown to motivate Sandeep to go out and save the hostages Pramoda and Shirley. So the same dialogue that started off as an innocent declaration of love eventually matured into a heart-broken plea for commitment. Many other such motifs were enriched in a similar way. All in all, smart use of props, dialogue, and music made Major an enjoyable, taut, meaningful narrative. 

 

In an interview with Major’s editors, Vinay Kumar Sirigineedi and Kodati Pavan Kalyan, they explained what a colossal task it was to edit down the film. In their words, it was an “endless task” with “an infinite number of edits”. In fact, they started editing alongside the shoot and continued editing up until the release date, a time period which spanned about two years. Both of them were also present during conversations with Major Unnikrishnan’s family and friends during the scripting and research phase of the project. This momentous professional investment was clearly evident in the film, which employed so many clever editing techniques that really drove home an emotionally-engaging yet tight-paced film.

 

 

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In an industry that has normalized three-hour movies, I found it to be a breath of fresh air to see a film that respected the audience’s time. The script insinuated three or four thematic pillars over which the narrative was draped and any scenes not beginning this thematic exploration in the first half or concluding this exploration in the second half seemed to be cut. While Sirigineedi and Kodati’s construction was concise, it also had its fair share of classic Telugu-hero-style slow motion sequences and melodramatic moments but they felt necessary rather than indulgent, for the most part. I thought it was an interesting choice to jump between different timelines. The film starts off in Kashmir, 2003 then jumps to Mumbai, 2018 then to Kerala in the 1980s then moves chronologically forward until it jumps backwards into a flashback of Isha and Sandeep’s marriage, then jumps forward to the 2008 Mumbai Attacks, and then finally closes out back in Mumbai, 2018. Given these leaps forward and backward in both location, time, and plot, it’s remarkable how east to follow the story is. In addition to narrative coherence, Sirigineedi and Kodati also use editing to enhance the storytelling. Their use of cross cutting during the scene where both the NSG and terrorists are going door-to-door was clever not only because it saved screen time, but also because it emphasized the cat and mouse game that the two groups were caught in (as Sirigineedi and Kodati said in an interview). Personally, my favorite sequence was the training montage, which really made us root for Sandeep because his improvement was shown both in terms of physical and mental strength. He started off struggling more than his classmates. To overcome this Sandeep trains harder and pushes himself to the edge of his physical ability. Here we admire his perseverance. Then we see him get ahead of his classmates. Now, the training montage could’ve ended here and probably would’ve under less able hands. But the montage continues and now introduces a rival classmate who shares Sandeep’s physical aptitude. This character is essential for us as an audience to understand what makes Sandeep different from the pack. Why is he so exceptional? What doesn’t make him just another soldier? The answer: his ideological battle. When Sandeep grapples with the question of what it means to be a soldier, we as an audience see that his growth is more than simply physical. He arrives at the conclusion that being a soldier means living every day for others, contrary to his classmate who views it simply as a competition that must be won at any cost. It is Sandeep’s combination of fitness with kindness that makes him the leader which his classmates follow by the end. That training sequence quite literally gives me goosebumps every time I watch it and it’s largely due to the expertise with which it has been constructed by Major’s editors. 

 

I can’t help myself but elaborate further about the construction of Maj Unnikrishnan’s character in the film. There is so much I appreciate about the sensitivity with which his traits were designed. Especially in the latter half of the film, where nearly thirty years of life collide with a tragic event that spans thirty hours (as Adivi Sesh so concisely said in an interview), we see why it was important to ground the story in Sandeep’s childhood and adolescence. It isn’t that Maj Unnikrishnan enters the terror situation with full know-how. Rather it’s his struggle and his need to dig deeper and deeper to find a will to survive and save others that makes his success that much more satisfying. He’s also not an unnecessary risk-taker. Rather, there is caution and discipline to his violence because his goal is to save victims rather than kill antagonists. It's about restorative justice rather than retributive justice. This restraint to violence made the action sequences that much more engaging to audiences since each blow was intentional rather than for shock value. When Maj Unnikrishnan hit by a bullet and was asked to come back to base, he controls himself and returns rather than acting as a lone agent. I felt like this was a pivotal moment because it showed a new sort of ‘heroism’ in Telugu cinema. Were this film were made ten or fifteen years ago, Sandeep would’ve been scripted to disregard his superior officer and go after the terrorist like a mad man. But Major doesn’t sensationalize this part of the story. Sandeep’s role isn’t to be a vengeful hero or take personal offence with what the terrorist has done. Rather, he needs to show restraint because the stakes are real. Death is not some imaginary possibility but a highly-plausible reality. Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan’s sacrifice instills reverence in audiences not because of theatrical play-acting but rather because he battled death with full knowledge of its brutality and inevitability. 

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Ultimately I believe that Major is a powerful film that dissects and digests a tragedy that has lodged itself within the Indian and Indian diaspora’s shared cultural consciousness. This film is brave because it converses with and clarifies popular notions about bravery and humanity with a sensitivity that I haven’t yet seen in Indian cinema. Rather than simply advocating for a fight against injustice, this movie advocates for standing up for justice. This reframing from negative to positive morality is refreshing and moderates the blunt absoluteness of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ in the context of national tragedy. Major is a thrilling celebration of Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan’s enduring legacy and an indication of the technical and thematic sophistication we can expect to see more and more of within Telugu-language film.