Batla House

On 19 September 2008, six days after serial bomb blasts killed at least 30 people across Delhi, a police special cell team walked into flat L-18 in the Batla House area of Jamia Nagar. Two suspects and an inspector died in the shootout that followed, and India split over what had happened: a counter-terror success to some, a staged killing to others. Nikkhil Advani's 'Batla House' takes the police side of that story, from a script by Ritesh Shah, who also co-wrote 'Pink'.

John Abraham plays ACP Sanjay Kumar, a character based on the real officer Sanjeev Kumar Yadav. By the time he reaches the building, his colleague Inspector K.K. Verma (Ravi Kishan) has already gone in and the shooting has started. After that, nothing goes his way. Two suspects got away, politicians and TV channels are calling it a fake encounter, and Sanjay is sliding into post-traumatic stress.

His wife Nandita (Mrunal Thakur), a TV news anchor, is close to walking out on him. While he hunts for the men who escaped, he'll also have to prove in court that the raid was what the police said it was. Nora Fatehi turns up in a small but key role and fronts 'O Saki Saki', a remake of the song from 'Musafir' (2004).

It opened on Independence Day, 15 August 2019, against Akshay Kumar's 'Mission Mangal', which won that box-office fight. 'Batla House' still passed 1.1 billion rupees worldwide and ended up a hit. Abraham and the raid scenes drew praise, but many Indian critics objected that the film never really questions the police.

• Action
• Drama
• Thriller