“Timmons was a set up,” wronged marksman, Swagger (Mark Wahlberg) tells an injured federal agent, Memphis (Michael Pena) while running away from those who he thought had hired him to protect the President of US! A stunning thriller of 2016, Shooter is one of those brilliant Hollywood films, that one remembers for decades, like Die Hard I, or Terminator II, or Enemy of the State etc. The hero of the film is hired, but, Timmons, a rank police officer is put in charge to kill him at just the right juncture to make it look like he tried to kill the President, before the crooked officer shot him! It was great watching it, with political sensibilities. Except for the end, which was good for the ego, but just a bit too fantastic to get reconciled with in our real world!

With the Pak film industry struggling to reinstate itself, there’s no formula better than to give us a superlative action movie, with a script that would make you give it a standing ovation. But, none, including Sham’oon Abbasi is ready to work on the action genre, a type of film that Pakistan hasn’t been able to excel in for the last 70 years! We have been atrociously bad in this genre. The only thriller that can be listed as our best work in this genre is Waar. Even Yalghaar was a damp squib!

Why are we neglecting the thriller genre, even now? About the only man working to make a name in it is Lashari, whose re-invented Maula Jutt has been in the studios for so long. With the modern cameras in our possession, and latest equipment in our hands, as well as new screens at our disposal, we are still not working on detective films, or action movies that could be presented to the world without a second thought!