Tiger 3, directed by Maneesh Sharma, continues the Yash Raj Spy Universe tradition of prioritising masala storytelling over empty mass moments. Make no mistake: the mass moments do exist. There's a sensational hero-face-reveal shot where Salman Khan (as Tiger) seems to be telling the villain: "No, you don't get to pull my trademark scarf off and reveal my face. I will decide when the scarf comes off!" Even better is the action stretch with another hero from this Spy Universe: to borrow a word from today's kids, it's… "goosebumps." And then there's the post-credits ending where… no, I won't spoil it for you, but this is another masterful buildup to a face-reveal. And of course, how can we forget the two women fighting in towels in a Turkish bathhouse. If the term "choreography of concealment" didn't exist, it would have to be coined for this mass scene with Katrina Kaif, as Tiger's wife Zoya.
But each one of these mass moments arises from the solid masala-flavoured writing. Shridhar Raghavan is credited with the screenplay, and Anckur Chaudhry with the dialogues. The writing is clean, if not as inspired as in Pathaan, but that's all this film needs. At the start of the film, we see a military coup in Pakistan. A little later, we see the villain step into the frame - not saying a word. And this is where we sense the tug of war in Pakistan between dictatorship and democracy. This popcorn-political "knot", established early on, is what propels the film till the end. The start isn't hectic. The story builds nice and slow to the first action set piece. Till then, we get the flashback of a major character (even the accented voice-acting here is so accurate). We get the wisdom: "pehle vajah, phir vaar". If you attack without provocation, then you are not a soldier but a terrorist. The punchline to this scene is a zinger: "Dushman vajah de chuka hai."
I wished they had pushed the husband-wife spy games a little more. After Zoya's loyalty is called into question, we get a Tiger song ('Ruaan…') with this phrase: "haq bhi tujh pe / shaq bhi tujh pe / mujhko to sudh budh rahi na." Had this confusion been woven into a scene or two, the film could have had a dramatic hero-heroine face-off in tandem with the hero-villain face-off. The reason for Zoya doing what she does is a tad underwhelming. But this is not a major deal-breaker. Because we are here for the action. There's a bike chase that plays like parkour on wheels. There's a set piece on a bridge with such insane imagination that I was laughing at the sheer madness of it all even as I was thrilling to the spectacle. In short, we get what we walked in for.
Anay Goswamy's cinematography is exhilarating. Tiger 3 has one stunning location after another, and we see how much a cinematographer can add to the action if the geography is gorgeous. Even an act as simple as a hostage handover plays out in something that looks like a gladiatorial arena. This is definitely a big-screen movie. It would have been even bigger with a better villain. Emraan Hashmi is not bad, but he is not able to bring out the angst of being humiliated by his own country, something John Abraham did so well in Pathaan. But Katrina Kaif and Salman Khan are in good form, and it's nice to see Revathy, Salman's romantic interest in 1991's Love, now as his boss. If 007 reported to M, Tiger reports to MM (that's what her initials are). Comparisons to Bond and the Mission: Impossible series are inevitable, but Tiger 3 stands on its own. This is rock-solid Indo-Western entertainment.