Dahaad aka Roar [dir. Reema Kagti]

I'll say one thing for Reema Kagti and her frequent collaborator Zoya Akhtar: With an output that includes material as diverse as Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (ZNMD), Talaash, Dil Dhadkne Do (DDD) and Gully Boy, they are certainly versatile. Of course, there is the question of whether this versatility is backed by sufficient substance. ZNMD and DDD are fluffy crowd-pleasers providing an aspirational upper-crust western-influenced lifestyle married with some desi sentiment; like Karan Johar films, but less insufferable. Talaash (2012) and Gully Boy (2019) treaded grimier territory - the former was a crime noir with some supernatural underpinnings, the latter showcased the gritty saga of a lower middle-class Muslim boy using art to first shut himself off from his circumstances, and then to rise above them. The results are more mixed here, but they do achieve a credible texture in their capture of the urban underbelly. Kagti also made a period sports film called Gold (2018) with the country's biggest wannabe patriot Akshay Kumar, which I really did not care for (my impressions HERE).

The point of this extended prelude is, if Kagti and Akhtar do not necessarily have first-hand knowledge of the culture and milieu captured in their crime series Dahaad, they can be relied on to do their research to provide a sufficiently nuanced portrayal, at least for the purposes of mainstream entertainment. The setting here is mofussil Rajasthan, primarily the town of Mandawa. Progress, both technological and social, is lagging behind metropolitan India: Smartphones are rare, as are dedicated career women. Sub-inspector Anjali Bhaati (Sonakshi Sinha) faces the double-whammy of being both a woman and a lower-caste. When her team goes investigating, Anjali is barred from entering the homes of the dominant caste. A running gag shows an upper-caste colleague in the police station lighting incense to ward off her aura. Her melodramatic mother is constantly at her to get married. Like with Sinha's previous character Akira, Anjali's reaction to these challenges is to double down and fight even harder, because to give an inch would be to give up the fight altogether.

In several ways this series' antagonist is her antithesis. Anand Swarnakar (Vijay Varma, who I first saw in Gully Boy) is the eldest son in a traditional well-to-do goldsmith family. He is an articulate soft-spoken language teacher, much admired by his pupils and colleagues. While dismissed by his businessman father as a non-achieving black sheep, he has a shining reputation for his efforts at educating children in remote areas during his weekend leisure. Even his wife, who is carrying on an affair with a workplace colleague, believes Anand to be a noble man. But Anand is also a serial killer that preys on lower-caste women, first seducing and then murdering them (no spoilers here, the series is not a whodunit, but about how he is ultimately caught).

Anjali and Anand's paths cross when she comes upon a string of disappearances of under-privileged women who apparently eloped with an unknown lover; she charts a connection between them, concluding that a single man is behind all of it. Of course, the idea of a serial killer in Mandawa is laughable to most of her colleagues. Her only support comes from Station House Officer Devi Singh (Gulshan Devaiah), whose interest in her may be more than professional. Going back and forth in time, the series follows Anand's crimes and the efforts of Anjali and her colleagues to unmask an intelligent and remorseless killer.

There are many things to like about Dahaad, but some missteps as well. Sonakshi's Anjali is a spunky protagonist, determined to breach the limits placed by society. Even if it occasionally seems too eager to signal Anjali's liberated spirit (she has a casual sex relationship with a drinking buddy we never see outside of that context) Kagti-Akhtar's characterization is strong in terms of expressing Anjali's determination to be a tough girl in a tough world. Devaiah's Devi Singh is less well-etched - It's nice to see the actor playing a "good guy", but Devi comes across so "correct" in all his opinions and actions, he is bland as oatmeal. His character has a 'manufactured' feel, as though Kagti-Akhtar wanted to imbue all their expectations for an ideal male into him. I was ready to throw up when Devi Singh gives his son the sort of enlightened talk about women and sex most metropolitan men wouldn't. Even when introducing the idea of Devi being attracted to Anjali (which may be further developed in the almost certain second season), they appear obliged to soften it by giving him a shrewish nag wife.

Sohum Shah's Parghi is a competing colleague to Anjali who is trying to obtain a transfer by currying favor with his superiors. He shows some interesting character development, especially in his reluctance to bring a child into an increasingly fucked up world (I empathize), but his transformation towards the end of the season could have been better articulated. Vijay Varma's killer is a lot more believable - his modus operandi is based on a real-life character dubbed as Cyanide Mohan. Unlike the glamorous psychopaths from the Hannibal Lecter universe, Anand doesn't believe in playing amusing mind-games with the police or arranging his victims in artistic tableaux. He is a blunt petty-minded villain, whose cloak of civility only shrouds an unmitigated ugliness. Even when alluding to a childhood trauma, the writing and Varma's performance do not try to generate sympathy for the character; they only show how he uses it to further manipulate people around him. 

A few logical missteps notwithstanding* my only disappointment was that the caste hierarchy element has little play in the investigation of the actual killer - It would have been interesting if Anjali's sometimes reckless pursuit of Anand had been labeled as caste revenge and affected her agency. Still, Dahaad was a nicely paced procedural with a well-realized setting, and I would recommend it to fans of dark crime thrillers.

*One thing that bothered me was, in a narrative so conscious of caste identity, why did the suspect's name Swarnakar (literally meaning 'Goldsmith') not ring immediate warning bells for the cops, especially since it is revealed to them beforehand that cyanide is used by the gold industry. Instead, they continue to fret over where he could obtain the poison. It also occurred to me a lot earlier than to these intrepid investigators that the killer, after having sex with his victims, was persuading them to consume the cyanide by disguising it as a contraceptive or morning-after pill.

Gadar - Ek Prem Katha [dir. Anil Sharma]

In preparation for the sequel now showing in the cinemas, I watched 2001's Gadar - Ek Prem Katha (The Revolt - A Love Story). Confession, this is the first time I have seen the whole film, as opposed to bits and pieces, mostly from its crazy climax. At the time of Gadar's theatrical release I was more a Lagaan fanboy, and this was the 'rival' film. I have to say, flaws notwithstanding this is a "propah" old-skool Bollywood masala drama, probably the best film in Anil Sharma's career. Of course, that in itself that is hardly high praise: Sharma made his name in the industry with camp fodder like Hukumat (1987), Elaan-e-Jung (1989) and Tahalka (1992). His Farishtay (1991) was so disgusting in its crass humor I had to switch off after a bit on account of the ick factor. But something about Gadar appears to have clicked with the man; in consequence he has turned out a film with both craft and heart.

Gadar's story (loosely adapted from the real-life tragedy of one Boota Singh) is an archetype grandiose Bollywood romance drama set against the backdrop of post-independence India-Pakistan. Headliner Sunny Deol plays turban-clad Jat trucker Tara Singh, with Jaspal Bhatti alumnus Vivek Shauq as his comic sidekick. Tara Singh has the hots for upper-class Muslim student Sakina (Amisha Patel). When the partition of India happens, Sakina's family after narrowly escaping massacre in the Hindu-Muslim riots boards the train to Pakistan, but she gets caught in the stampede and is left behind. Later she hears that her family was killed enroute to Lahore. The gallant Tara rescues her from Hindu attackers and offers to escort her to relatives in Lahore. She opts to settle with him in India, and they bear a child as well. Later Sakina discovers her family alive and well in Pakistan, and it is arranged that she will visit them with her husband and son.

Alas, her father Ashraf Ali (Amrish Puri) is a prominent Pakistani politician and a bigot that hates India with a passion. In a bid to cut off his daughter's connections with the former homeland, he deceives her into traveling alone, then holds her captive in Lahore using emotional blackmail. Sensing that all is not right with Sakina, Tara decides he has to enter Lahore and get her back, even if it carries the deadly risk of being considered a spy. When his peaceful approaches with her high-placed family fail, our humble trucker wages a one-man war against a virtual battalion of the Pakistani armed forces.

The chemistry between the lead pair of Deol and Amisha Patel works well for Gadar and is the driving factor for on-screen events. You like the couple, and cheer for their attempts to come together. Sakina is inconsistent in the writing: Sometimes she is a total wallflower, reduced to crying in bed waiting for her "shohar" (husband) to rescue her, while in others she spiritedly defies her captors. In the climax she is even cocking a rifle, ready to fire at the military pursuers hunting her family. Still, Amisha conveys the right amount of sweetness for the part and comes across more dignified than most of her later on-screen and off-screen appearances. It has been my (snobbish) opinion that Sunny Deol plays the bulk of his characters with the subtlety of a truck driver / stevedore, so he is aptly cast in the trucker's part (although the accent he uses to address Sakina as "Madam ji" betrays a convent school education than how an actual illiterate person would say it). His Tara Singh displays an openhearted bonhomie in his happy moments, and when he gives vent to his anger, you sympathize and cheer for him. Veteran thespian Amrish Puri as Sakina's father gives a layered portrayal of villainy, caught between his possessive love for his daughter and his hatred for Indians.

Up to a point Gadar is fairly restrained compared to Sharma's other films (even though Deol always has the ability to beat up scores of people, and in one iconic scene, pulls out a hand-pump by its roots to clobber a mob). The climax involves Tara Singh & Co commandeering a goods train while they are pursued by convoys of soldiers and even an attack helicopter. It's ridiculous, but unabashedly so, and reminds one of the extravagant climaxes from Buster Keaton's The General, and Jackie Chan's Police Story 3: Supercop (reviewed HERE). Apart from a mid-movie slump where multiple song sequences are bunched together, Gadar is surprisingly well-paced by Bollywood standards; the 2hr56min experience was less of a slog than I feared. I only hope the sequel maintains that same trait.

The full movie is available to view (without subtitles) on the Zee Movies Hindi channel on Youtube:

Maamannan [dir. Mari Selvaraj]

Caste identity and discrimination has been the backbone of most of Mari Selvaraj's filmography thus far - those that haven't seen them, I heartily commend Baradwaj Rangan's reviews of Pariyerum Perumal (2018) and Karnan (2021). Pariyerum... told the non-fluffy story of a  romance that transgressed caste norms and the fallout that occurred in its wake. Karnan, in which Dhanush plays the Angry Young Man from an outcast community, can plot-wise be regarded as a "Hero stands up for the oppressed masses" potboiler, but the script and direction gave it a distinctive identity - for me it was one of the best films of 2021. With his latest, Maamannan, Mari leans towards the commercial angle in his telling. This has the consequence of making the narrative more mundane than his previous ventures, but it is still quite acceptable as a mainstream movie told from the POV of the oppressed class.

As the title character, Tamil cinema's favorite 90's crass comedian Vadivelu gets a rare serious role, and he plays with obvious relish. His Maamannan is the respected leader - an MLA - from the scheduled-caste community, courted by the state ruling party for his ability to garner public support. Maamannan is admired all around him...that is, all except his son Athiveeran (Udhayanidhi Stalin). A la Ramesh Sippy's Shakti, there is between father and son a coldness, a wall of silence, whose reasons are couched in an incident from the past. There is also a marked difference in their attitudes. While Mamannan works for the upliftment of his people, there is still a core of servility in him: he accepts his rise in the political world as a gift given him by his upper-caste masters and at political meetings stands with folded arms, ready to receive instruction. Athiveeran, who runs a martial arts school, is more militant, preferring to demand and, when required, snatch by force his rights from the privileged. As a proud symbol of his caste origins, he rears pigs, and has a pig tattoo on his hand. He even paints pictures of pigs with wings, a symbol of the liberation he hopes for his community.

The third major player is Rathnavel (Fahadh Faasil), the rowdy upper-caste politico who treats Mamannan like a family serf. Rathnavel's character screams 'Bad Man' - when his prized hound fails in the local dog race, he beats the poor pooch to death. His cruel and domineering attitude eventually brings him in conflict with Athiveeran and later Mamannan. Pushed against the wall, it is up to Mamannan, whether to crumble and bow down to his masters' wishes or grow a spine and stand up against them regardless of cost.

Mamannan is a masala film, but within that space it tries to stand out. While there are fight scenes where Athiveeran shows his ability to beat up dozens of goons, the film does not devolve into a brainless machismo action fest. Female lead Keerthi Suresh is not the usual birdbrained damsel in distress - she has both the courage and the wits to be an equal companion to Athiveeran's fight for equality. 

There are a few caveats, of course. Apart from Stalin being some 20 years older than the role he plays, the utter lack of nuance in Faasil's villain is a letdown. The screenplay could have done with some serious tightening - the lengthy stretch where Maamannan fights a guerrilla poll war against Rathnavel is mostly uninvolving. This notwithstanding, I found Maamannan more palatable than 2021's hyped Jai Bhim which reduced the lower castes to faceless victims dependent on being rescued by benevolent upper-caste heroes. Like Karnan, this movie at least exhorts the oppressed to stand up for themselves instead of looking for external saviors, and that's a sentiment I approve of.