Should rape be used as a mere tool in revenge sagas? Rape, not what goes beyond the acceptable level of force for men, but a woman’s experience of violation and its aftermath. To watch Kaabil, Sanjay Gupta’s latest feature, is to confront this emotive subject barefaced, for the way it places rape and its reverberation in its narrative universe is something that we must talk about, loudly.
Since the debut of its trailer, the logline of Kaabil has been clear and precise. A blind man avenges his love’s loss. The first half of the film, painstakingly, establishes a cloying romance between two visually challenged characters, Rohan (Hrithik Roshan) and Supriya (Yami Gautam), before horror comes knocking down their door.
It comes in the form of a local goon - Amit (Rohit Roy) and his friend - who rape Supriya. The local police refuse to file a case, and the struggle of the couple to get justice becomes a herculean task. At such a juncture, back home, Supriya in an effort to force herself back into normalcy, cooks dinner, but Rohan refuses to eat, because evidently he is the one who is disturbed by what she underwent. And then transpires a scene that is most aggravating and insensitive. Rohan sits quiet and unfed in a corner as Supriya begs him to sleep. But he just wants to be left alone. Now Supriya tells Rohan, with tears in her eyes, that she totally understands how she is not the same for him, so if he wants she could leave this house and go back to her old job. Rohan sits on in sulky silence, not agreeing, not refuting.
This scene as an important cog in the wheel of a tale is so unsettling that it leaves you wondering how the director, the actor, the producer or anyone who was associated with it could let it pass. The scene actually goes on to indulge Rohan’s state of mind, quite brazenly, when it was Supriya who is actually the victim of such a heinous crime.
And that self-pitying dialogue by Supriya makes one realise that perhaps even in today’s politically correct and apparently ‘fair’ world, women are still nothing but a measure of a man’s worth and honour. This is a woman who, from the very beginning, has been vocally established as someone who is strong, confident and independent, despite her handicap. But when the rape occurs, we are presented an entirely opposite spine.
This scene, horribly troubling, could also have been so in order to show an unexpected reaction, the devil’s advocate might argue. Rohan’s character is sad about his own shortcomings - that he hasn’t been able to protect her - and the director seems to be aiming for 51 shades of grey. This might have worked, had Yami’s Supriya been shown having dealt with it in a stronger way. But it wasn't so and hence, Rohan’s lone reaction is too lame to stand on its own feet, for the film is so focused on the idea of creating a revenge thriller, that the conception of a full-blooded universe has been totally negated in favour of cardboard characters, a clear demarcation of black and white, a clear line between right and wrong. There are no shades of grey.
The next day, Rohan realises his mistake, his dreadful reaction the previous night, and comes back to apologise to her, but by then she has already committed suicide, and the film sets its revenge blueprint in motion. Rohan goes on to plan and execute his vengeance, his barely expressed guilt turns into righteous anger, gifting agonising deaths to the culprits. But except one apology, which I have already mentioned, Rohan doesn’t bother to blame himself even once for his sheer reckless response, that it might have left her so lonely that she pushed herself to death.
This is the kind of depiction of rape that we have resorted to. The world is lauding Paul Verhoeven’s Elle, a French language film that deals with the aftermath of rape, but refuses to pronounce the experience or the effects of rape in moral terms. When the titular character, Michèle (Isabelle Hupert), is raped, she is shattered no doubt, but picks up the pieces and gets on with her life. The incident is etched in her mind, and does of course mentally and emotionally wound her, but she and those around her, deal with it, without any sordid silences of tainted honour.
Expecting such expertise in an air of ambiguity from mainstream Hindi films is perhaps too much to ask for, but that a film which caters to the common mass of India trivialises rape, specially at a time when violence against women is rampant, and feminism is gaining ground in common discourses, is shocking to say the very least.
Rakesh Roshan’s attempt to salvage his son’s sinking stardom is so fraught that it expects Supriya’s character to exist only to serve Roshan junior. The plot strategy is clear from the very beginning, the camera favouring him more than her, so that we can witness how many oceans of expressions Roshan is capable of. Despite being not in support of marriage, Supriya gives in to marriage all thanks to persuasion by her man, without an ounce of doubt. Till here, Supriya remained a bloodless prop, unfortunate but not alarming, given the vanity of the family project. But tragedy strikes, and a single scene bares the moral bankruptcy of the makers. This is singularly disquieting, and without redemption.
For long, Hindi cinema has made a sacrificial lamb out of women for the convenience of storytelling. If she is not a romantic prop, she could be part of the scheme to titillate. Though cinema in the new millennium still looks forward to item girls to entertain the audience for a few extra bucks, it has at least come a long way from the horrible 80s, when rape was the salacious topping in certain commercial Hindi films.
Of course, while we still have Prabhu Deva carrying the same lens for women, the alternate universe of Hindi cinema mercifully finds lascivious depiction of rape, unfavourable now due to increasing political appropriateness, and the talk of women’s rights and feminism gaining momentum on social media.
But Kaabil brings the horrors of our forgotten ancestors back to the present, fresh and puerile for consumption. Gupta, who always favoured the masculine approach towards storytelling, uses rape simply as a device. Because it will give the hero the right push for his retribution, nothing more and nothing less.
There is zero attempt at understanding the only woman in the tale. Despite a problematic reaction to the rape, Roshan’s character has no guilt in his heart, only clear cut revenge to elicit whistles. Fine, it’s not a film dealing with the grey zones, it can’t offer prolonged scenes of self-realisation, but at least don’t disservice the woman you’re fighting for. He is made out to be an honourable hero, without repentance, without self-reproach.
Cinema and TV are mass media, and unlike any other art forms, impact popular culture in ways more than one. And if star-driven major films continue to depict violence towards women in such fashion without remorse, it will normalise patriarchal attitudes and render them trouble-free. Which is why, we must denounce such scenes and constantly call out films which reduce women only to her flesh.
Over to you, feminists.
(The writer is a journalist and a screenwriter who believes in the insanity of words, in print or otherwise; he tweets @RanjibMazumder)
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