‘Pippa’ Review: An Effective Ishaan Khatter Leads an Earnest but Middling Film

Coming from a family where both his father and older brother (Priyanshu Painyuli as Ram) are war heroes, a young Balram Singh Mehta (Ishaan Khatter) garners a reputation as an irresponsible troublemaker. As this man’s coming-of-age story, Raja Krishna Menon’s Pippa is easy to get invested in, especially since the boyish Khatter fits that kind of arc beautifully. 

The film, named after the PT-76 amphibious tanks used during the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war, focuses mainly on the Battle of Garibpur. The best thing about Pippa is that, as a war film, it focuses on bravado and humanity. The scene where Balram drives by scores of refugees, displaced from their land, is poignant even if a little gimmicky. 

The way the film views refugees is one of the more humane discussions about the refugee crisis in the media; a character remarks, “Nobody willingly leaves their home”. 

Pippa has three major narrative arcs led by the three siblings of the Mehta family – Balram, a tank expert, is crucial to India’s defence, his elder brother Ram is undercover with the Mukti Bahini in East Bengal, and their sister Radha (Mrunal Thakur) is working tirelessly to decode covert messages. Even though the focus is on Balram, both Thakur and Painyuli play their supporting acts with gusto. It is, in a way, a brains vs. brawn offering – Radha is the mind, Ram is the might – and both these aspects are highlighted well by the screenplay and the actors. 

Khatter, while easily convincing as the young and brash Balram in the sequences before they set out to the battlefields, does seem like he is straining to fill in the shoes of a leader barking orders at his unit.

When the film focuses on the character's inner turmoil, most notably his fractured memories of his father and the strained relationship with his brother, Khatter shines.

The battle scenes are successful in portraying prowess (the Pippa tanks are majestic and magnificent) but not tension. The stakes are high; several times people proclaim that this is a battle for a whole population’s freedom and identity. But some of the monologues feel less like pep talks and more like the writers are making sure the audience hasn’t forgotten the scene they’ve set. 

Therefore, not all the scenes that are structured to create urgency manage to do so. The one that succeeds the most, in my opinion, is the one where the soldiers standing around carrying out the comparatively mundane task of cooking together have to run to their posts after they're attacked.

There is a large human cost in times like war but most of the scenes attempting to portray that reality feel half-baked. Most of the conversations the film is trying to have – from Radha’s agency in her family and in the bigger world to how much actual danger Ram is in and even the ways in which civilian lives are affected during times of war – all feel underdeveloped. 

Because the stakes aren’t set up well, the payoff doesn’t feel nearly as effective. I do, however, appreciate that the film focuses on the soldiers at the forefront as humans above all else. Their priorities are different and so are their views about the impending war and yet, they all stand and fight together. The camaraderie is believable because Pippa doesn’t allow them to become mere caricatures pushing Balram’s story forward. 

There is, however, the fact that an actor of Soni Razdan’s caliber is all but wasted in the film. One of the film’s most powerful scenes is her reminding Balram that they, too, are refugees, having migrated from Rawalpindi. She forms the film’s moral compass and yet, we see woefully little of her. 

Pippa’s visual language sets it apart from the war films that are full of chest-thumping without a modicum of nuance and the understanding of something as devastating as war and the credit goes primarily to cinematographer Priya Seth. The way the song ‘Main Parwaana’ is shot adds to the song’s allure, setting it apart even from the film’s own rhythm (in a good way). 

For the most part Pippa, despite its flaws, keeps you engaged because of how earnest the storytelling is but more investment into a richer setting would’ve helped. In a film named ‘Pippa’ the story of the way Balram finds solace (perhaps?) in his attachment to a machine while he prepares to fight for liberation, honour, and even personal goals, is lost. But what a story that would’ve been. 

Maybe it’s the attempt at summarising a book (The Burning Chaffees: A Soldier's First-Hand Account of the 1971 War by Brig. Balram Singh Mehta) into a film while trying to give everything its due space but the ending feels rushed. 

I think again of Shershaah, one of the finer offerings in the genre, and how the film leaves you thinking and feeling heavier than perhaps you expected. That was a win, Pippa is at best an honest effort.  

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