Parmanu: The Story of Pokhran

Ashwat Raina writes a report arguing that a nuclear test must be carried out. The report is not taken seriously and an attempt is made anyway; it goes wrong. Ashwat is blamed and removed. Years later the government changes and he is called back. This time he chooses his own team. The problem is not technical; the real matter is that the test must not be noticed. American satellites watch the Pokhran desert constantly and every movement of a spade is seen. The team enters the area in disguise. The work will be done at night and the satellite passes will be calculated. Abhishek Sharma directs. John Abraham plays Ashwat; Diana Penty and Boman Irani are in the cast. The language is Hindi. Its ground is real; the nuclear tests carried out at Pokhran in 1998 were India's second series and drew international reaction. The film is built as a narrative of assembling a team and keeping a secret; the scientific detail is thinned. The matter it treats is secrecy; the tension comes not from the test itself but from the risk of being seen. The film puts an official rather than the scientists at the centre and that choice was criticised. The narrative proceeds in a nationalist register and gives no room to opposing views. John Abraham is one of the producers. The narrative raises the pace in the desert sections and the last part turns into a countdown. Its limit is its outlook; the narrative is one sided, the history simplified, and the ending celebratory. Who it is for: viewers who like Indian cinema and thrillers drawn from real events. Who it is not for: it is argumentative, conventional, and the ending reads as propaganda.