Review: ‘An Action Hero,’ starring Ayushmann Khurrana and Jaideep Ahlawat

January 7, 2023

by Carla Hay

Jaideep Ahlawat and Ayushmann Khurrana in “An Action Hero” (Photo courtesy of AA Films)

“An Action Hero”

Directed by Anirudh Iyer

Hindi with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in India and the United Kingdom, the action comedy film “An Action Hero” features a predominantly Indian cast of characters (with some white people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A famous action movie star goes on the run after he accidentally kills a corrupt politician, and the dead man’s brother goes after the movie star for revenge. 

Culture Audience: “An Action Hero” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching action movies that make up for their simple plots with plenty of high-octane thrills and satirical comedy.

Ayushmann Khurrana and Jaideep Ahlawat in “An Action Hero” (Photo courtesy of AA Films)

“An Action Hero” is a completely predictable chase movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously. It manages to be entertaining because of its cheeky comedy, thrilling action and satirical take on celebrity worship of movie stars. Many of the stunts in “An Action Hero” are very over the top, which will either amuse or annoy viewers.

Directed by Anirudh Iyer and written by Neeraj Yadav, “An Action Hero” takes place in India and the United Kingdom in a non-stop action-adventure that tells the story of an international hunt for a movie star suspected of murder. The movie begins in India, where action movie star Maanav Khuranna (played by Ayushmann Khurrana) is being interrogated about his connection to the death of Vicky Solanki (played by Sumit Singh), a corrupt politician from Mandothi, India. The movie then switches flashbacks to show whot Maanav ended up in this predicament.

At the time of Vicky’s death, he was in the midst of contesting election results showing that he has lost his most recent election. Vicky was seeking out Maanav to get Maanav to give Vicky a personal endorsement, in order to use Maanav’s star power to possibly sway the results of the election. Vicky was also star-struck and desperately wanted a photo with Maanav. Maanav doesn’t want to get involved in politics, so he was actively avoiding Vicky, who went as far as showing up uninvited on the set of one of Maanav’s movies in Mandothi, and interrupting Vicky’s work.

One day, Maanav gets a new Ford Mustang as a gift. He’s eager to take his new car out for an evening drive. During this drive, Maanav notices that Vicky is following him on a deserted road. Vicky forces Maanav stop the car. The two men have a heated argument, which results in a physical brawl, where Maanav pushes Vicky back in self-defense. Vicky falls down, hits his head on rock, and dies instantly.

In a panic, Maanav quickly drives away, not noticing that one of his car’s side mirrors (which got broken off during the fight) has been left behind at the scene. Vicky is reported missing by his worried older brother Bhoora Solanki (played by Jaideep Ahlawat), a Mandothi municipal councilor. Bhoora tells investigators that Vicky had gone to meet Maanav.

Led by an inspector named Roop Kumar (played by Jitender Hooda), the local police arrive at the scene and find Vicky’s dead body. They also find the broken side mirror nearby. It doesn’t take long for the investigators to find out that Maanav is the new owner of a black Ford Mustang that has the exact same type of side mirror. Maanav has now become a person of interest in Vicky’s death and he is sought for questioning.

An enraged Bhoora is convinced that Maanav murdered Vicky. And so, Bhoora vows to get revenge by hunting down Maanav and killing him. Inspector Kumar is also leading a search to find Maanav, but Bhoora thinks the police are buffoons, and Bhoora wants to get his own brand of justice. Bhoora often berates Inspector Kumar, and he wages a public campaign to ruin Maanav’s reputation. The media has now branded Maanav as the chief suspect in Vicky’s death.

Maanav has fled Mandothi by taking a plane to Mumbai. While on the plane, there’s a satirical moment when Maanav meets real-life movie star Akshay Kumar, in a cameo as a version of himself. Akshay tells Maanav: “You’re going to win an Oscar for India some day.” Maanav confides in Akshay about why he suddenly left town. Akshay advises him: “I know from experience. Don’t tell anyone.”

After Maanav lands in Mumbai, he then takes another plane to London, where he hears on the news that police in India are looking for him. And, of course, Bhoora is hot on Maanav’s trail too. Most of the fight scenes in the movie (as already revealed in the trailer) involves Maanav’s conflicts with Bhoora, who has a group of thugs who are helping Bhoora.

Maanav also gets some help to evade the people who are after him. In London, Maanav gets assistance from his attorney Vishwas Patel (played by Siddharth Amar), who tell Maanav to lay low until they can figure out a way the best way for him to return to India to answer questions from authorities. Maanav also has a goofy personal assistant named Guddu (played by Pankaj Mathur), communicates with Maanav mainly by phone while Maanav has gone into hiding.

Maanav has a house in London, but it should come as no surprise that Maanav finds out that he isn’t going to be safe at his London home. The rest of “An Action Hero” involves Maanav getting mixed up with more shady characters, including Kaadir (played by Vaquar Shaikh), a notorious “fixer” for gangster Masood Abraham Katkar (played by Gautam Joglekar), who has a grudge against Maanav because Maanav did a TV interview saying that underworld gangsters are “irrelevant.” Maanav also enlists the help of two computer hackers: Sai (played by Neeraj Madhav) and Li Xian (played by Elton Tan), who might or might not be of any real help.

In between all the mayhem, the movie has a few musical numbers that poke fun at Bollywood action movies that force out-of-place song-and-dance numbers into action movies. In these sequences, Maanav sees himself as a hero who’s irresistible to women. Malaika Arora portrays Manaav’s leading lady for the song “Aap Jaisa Koi.” Nora Fatehi is Manaav’s leading lady for the song “Jehda Nasha.” Maanav is too busy trying not to get killed to really have a love interest in this story.

As the action here on the run, Khuranna carries the movie quite well, considering he has to portray a movie star whose action skills that he learned in movies are put to the test his “real life.” “An Action Hero” constantly lampoons Maanav’s “worth” as an action star, because on how well he can get himself out of predicaments. Don’t expect this movie to have complete realism, since much of it is quite cartoonish in how Maanav and the rest of the characters are portrayed.

“An Action Hero” is by no means an intellectual movie, but the movie is effective in poking fun at the media’s role in hyping celebrities while also seeking to “cancel” celebrities by always looking for celebrity scandals, only to try to build back up disgraced celebrities who are deemed worthy of making a comeback. The movie takes a sarcastic view of all the sensationalist, tabloid tactics that have become commonplace in mainstream media. These sardonic observations make “An Action Hero” slightly better than the usual formulaic action flick.

AA Films released “An Action Hero” in select U.S. cinemas and in India on December 2, 2022.

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