Some films arrive with noise. Ikkis arrives with silence, the kind that settles in your chest long after the screen fades to black.

Directed by Sriram Raghavan, Ikkis tells the story of Second Lieutenant Arun Khetarpal, one of India’s youngest Param Vir Chakra awardees. But this is not just a war film, and it certainly isn’t a chest-thumping patriotic spectacle. At its heart, Ikkis is a story about a father remembering his son, and a country remembering a young man who never got the chance to grow old.

The film opens decades after the 1971 India-Pakistan war. Brigadier M.L. Khetarpal, now aged and weary, travels back to Pakistan carrying questions he has lived with for years. From there, the narrative gently slips into the past into Arun’s youth, his training, his friendships, his love, and eventually, the battlefield where history would remember him as “Ikkis”.

Agastya Nanda, in his first theatrical role, plays Arun with surprising restraint. He doesn’t try to be heroic every second, and that works in the film’s favour. Arun feels like a real young officer confident, stubborn, occasionally playful, and fully aware of the risks that come with the uniform. There’s sincerity in Agastya’s performance that makes you root for him, not because the script demands it, but because he feels human.

Then there is Dharmendra and it’s impossible to talk about Ikkis without pausing here. This is his final film, and that knowledge quietly reshapes every frame he’s in. As the grieving father, Dharmendra doesn’t rely on dialogue. His silences speak louder. A glance, a pause, a trembling breath these moments carry decades of sorrow. Watching him feels less like watching a performance and more like witnessing a farewell, both personal and cinematic.

The war sequences themselves are grounded and tense, never glamorised. Raghavan avoids excess background score and dramatic slow motion. Instead, the combat feels chaotic, frightening, and painfully real. The bravery on display doesn’t look cinematic, it looks costly. That choice gives the film its emotional weight.

The film does stumble at places. The pacing isn’t always even, and a few emotional beats arrive earlier than they should. But Ikkis isn’t interested in perfection. It is interested in remembrance, and on that front, it succeeds.

By the time the film ends, it doesn’t leave you with adrenaline. It leaves you with heaviness. With gratitude. With the quiet realisation that some heroes don’t live long enough to see their legacy, but their stories live longer than they ever could.

Ikkis may not be Sriram Raghavan’s sharpest film, but it is certainly one of his most sincere. And as Dharmendra’s final bow, it feels dignified, emotional, and deeply earned.

This is not a film you watch for entertainment alone.
It’s a film you watch to remember.