Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty (2014): watch free, legally

A holiday interrupted in Mumbai

Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty is a 2014 Indian Hindi-language action thriller written and directed by A. R. Murugadoss. Akshay Kumar plays Virat Bakshi, a Captain in DIA, described as a secret wing of the Indian Army. Sonakshi Sinha, Freddy Daruwala, Sumeet Raghavan and Govinda, in a special appearance, also star. The film remakes Murugadoss’s 2012 Tamil film Thuppakki.

Virat returns to his Mumbai home for a 40-day holiday. His parents promptly arrange a meeting with Saiba Thapar, hoping that she will marry him. He initially dismisses her as old fashioned and unsuitable for him. That impression changes when he sees Saiba, a professional boxer with a modern outlook, in a boxing match. Virat falls in love with her instantly.

His leave takes a darker turn during a bus journey with his friend, Sub-Inspector Mukund “Makiya” Deshmukh. After a passenger reports a stolen wallet, Virat becomes suspicious of a man trying to flee a check. A bomb explodes, killing innocent people, and Virat captures the suspect, Ajmal Lateef. Ajmal is a terrorist who planted the bomb, though he escapes from hospital with help from a police mole.

Virat takes Ajmal again and interrogates him, seeking the mole’s identity. He learns that corrupt ACP Ashok Gaikwad helped Ajmal and forces Gaikwad to commit suicide. Contents from Ajmal’s bag reveal a plan for serial Mumbai blasts, intended to be carried out within days by 12 sleeper agents, including Ajmal. Virat gathers fellow Army officers and Mukund to locate the bombers before they can trigger the attacks.

A sleeper-cell threat

The operation brings consequences. The sleeper-cell leader learns of the officers who stopped the planned attack, after his brother Afsar Ali, one of the sleeper bombers, is killed. He goes to the home of Virat’s colleague Joel, kills Joel’s family and finds an album containing photographs of the team. The group begins targeting a female relative of each officer and kidnaps them.

When Virat understands the plan, he substitutes his younger sister Preeti for one of the intended victims. With his dog Rocky and Preeti’s dupatta, he reaches the terrorists’ hideout. The pursuit reveals that the organization extends beyond the men at the hideout, and Virat captures Asif Ali, identified as the group’s leader, only to discover that Asif is second-in-command. The threat then turns directly toward Virat and the officers closest to him.

The leader kills officer Kapil and his family in a blast, then forces Virat to surrender. Virat makes plans involving Mukund, Joel and a tracking chip inserted in his arm. He drives to a port in various cars under instructions from the sleeper-cell leader, arriving at a ship full of terrorists. There he discovers that the cars contain bombs intended to frame him and his team as terrorists, while the group seeks to recruit sleeper cells in the Indian Army with assistance from Joint Defence Secretary Alvin D’Souza.

Murugadoss remakes Thuppakki

Kumar said that his production company Hari Om Entertainment signed the story after Murugadoss described its first action sequence, before the script had been fully written. Because of date issues, Kumar let Murugadoss make the story first as the Tamil film Thuppakki, then later announced the Hindi remake. Production began in 2013 under the working title Pistol, with Cape Of Good Films and Sunshine Pictures.

Murugadoss said Kumar lost weight for the Army-officer role and aimed to look 12 years younger than his real biological age. Kumar also wore a crew-cut hairstyle. Sonakshi Sinha plays Saiba, Virat’s love interest and a boxer, while model and debutant Freddy Daruwala plays the main antagonist opposite Kumar. Greg Powell was the stunt coordinator.

Pritam Chakraborty composed the songs, with lyrics by Irshad Kamil for the songs in the film and lyrics by Sukumar Dutta for “Palang tod.” Prasad Sashte composed the background score. The soundtrack album was released on 12 May 2014, and the songs followed on 2 June. The film was released worldwide on 6 June 2014. At the 60th Filmfare Awards, Kumar received a Best Actor nomination.

Film details from the Wikipedia article “Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty”. Text adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0.