Casts: Saif Ali Khan,
Katrina Kaif, Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub, Sabyasachi Chakrabarty, Sohaila Kapur
Banner: UTV Motion Pictures
and Nadiadwala Grandson Entertainment
Director: Kabir Khan
Producer: Sajid Nadiadwala and
Siddharth Roy Kapur
Screenplay: Kabir
Khan and Parveez Shaikh
Music: Pritam Chakraborty
Release Date: 28th
August 2015
Story line: Phantom
movie is about the post-26/11 attacks in Mumbai and global terrorism. Saif
Ali Khan and Katrina Kaif were cast in leading roles, as secret
agents/mercenaries. The film earlier had a working title as Daniyal Khan,
before being titled Phantom.
Phantom is a political thriller that unfolds
across various countries around the world. The plot revolves around protagonist
Daniyal, whose journey to seek justice takes him from India to Europe, America
and the volatile Middle East. However, he finds out that in a mission like
this, there is always a price to pay, in this case, a very personal price.
Saif Ali Khan plays Daniyal an Indian agent
who vows to get inside Hariz Saeed’s home, kill him on the spot, and take his
revenge for attacking Mumbai. Hariz Saeed is a veiled reference to Hafiz Saeed,
the Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief who is wanted in India for his involvement in the
26/11 attacks.
Know more about the captain of the Ship, the
director: Kabir Khan (born 1971) is an
Indian film director, screenwriter, and cinematographer. He started his career
working in documentary films, and then made his feature film directorial debut
in 2006 with Kabul Express which was followed by New York (2009) and Ek Tha
Tiger (2012).
Khan started his career at age 24 as a
cinematographer for the Discovery Channel documentary film Beyond the Himalayas
(1996) directed by Gautam Ghosh. He then made his own directorial debut with
the documentary The Forgotten Army (1999) based on Subhas Chandra Bose's Indian
National Army. He then directed two more documentaries before shifting his
focus to mainstream cinema. Kabir’s last directorial venture Bajrangi Bhaijaan
was declared an ALL TIME BLOCBUSTER by “Box office India”.
Facts And Figures:
• Film is an
adaptation of Hussain Zaidi’s book Mumbai Avengers, and the screenplay of the
film has been written in co-ordination with the author. Zaidi is also associate
producer of the HBO documentary Terror in Mumbai, which is based on the 26/11
attacks in Mumbai
• Saif Ali Khan and
Katrina Kaif have reportedly learnt Kurdish and Arabic for their roles.
• The film earlier had a working title
as Daniyal Khan, before being titled Phantom
• On 20 August, it was reported that the
film was banned from release in Pakistan by the Lahore High Court after a plea
was filed by Hafiz Saeed.
• Both Saif Ali Khan and Katrina Kaif
have performed intense action sequences, and have not used stunt doubles for
most of their scenes, having instead done the scenes themselves
• The
shooting of the film was completed in 90 days.
• The worldwide premiere of the film is
scheduled for the Indian Film Festival of Melbourne on its closing night, 27
August 2015.
• Shooting of the movie is done in the
various international location likes Beirut, Lebnon, Turkey, Wembley and
recently they completed shooting at Vancouver, Canada and now they are shooting
at Gateway Of India in Mumbai. Some shots of the movie is also shoot in the
beautiful location of Gulmarg in Jammu and Kashmir.
• Budget of this movie is 50 crore and Running
time is 2hr 28minutes.
My
Gut Feel and comments:
Hats off to the versatility of a director
Kabir Khan where last month he brought Bajrangi Bhaijaan to the audience and
now coming up with Phantom where in both the cases our sensitive relationship
with Pakistan has been shown with two different poll apart perspectives. And
in both the cases story seems to be presented with great conviction and honesty
which is not an easy task.
Phantom is an adaptation of Hussain Zaidi’s
book Mumbai Avengers which would lead to a tight gripped screenplay
and going by the credentials of Kabir khan who started his career as documentary
film maker, I am sure he would have done justice to the this
sensitive subject where margin of error is quite less . Kabir khan
did a decent job earlier as well in case of Newyork and Ek tha tiger which is
of similar plot like Phantom. He knows the art of balancing the presentation of
story in realistic manner at the same time keeping the mass appeal and
commercial viability intact which resulted in box office success and getting decent
critical admiration.
Performing consistently is a difficult task
however till know Kabir Khan did able to manage to do the justice to audience
expectations from his films even while choosing tricky subjects. I am expecting
Phantom to be a good movie and with moderate budget it should recover the
cost and do decent box office business.
I am giving this movie 3 stars out
of 5 stars, six day before the release.