Towards the end of Mani Ratnam’s long-awaited Raavan (2010), one of the characters looks at the camera and says “You shouldn’t have turned back”. He might well have been talking to the person behind the camera. Raavan is a visual and narrative mess, with lots going for it and even more going against it. What seems to be a major hammering on a minor flash of brilliance has taken over three years to make. There is nothing much about the plot of Raavan that you already haven’t read in your schoolbooks and seen in your televisions. I suggest you read the Wikipedia entry on Ramayana and plug in the actors’ names beside the characters’ yourself. You wouldn’t be very wrong. There are, however, two major changes to the text that writer-director Mani Ratnam has done. One; the back story of Ram has been removed altogether and a new back story for Raavan has been added which attempts to put things in his perspective and to justify his acts. The second and the more important change is that Raavan has been relegated from a higher caste to a lower one. The second change opens up a number of new possibilities given the setting of the film.
Throughout his career, with a few exceptions, Mani Ratnam has been interested in writing stories in which personal drama plays out along and against national affairs and topical issues. Almost all these ‘issues’ that he deals with could be traced to newspaper articles or cover stories (communal riots in the city of Bombay, cross border terrorism in the far east and north, student protests down south, the LTTE, business scams etc.). It is true that there is seldom any rigor in these analyses, but where Mani really scores is in the other layer of these stories, in which he deals with people who are stuck in (or, less frequently, who help create) these social and political upheavals. He seems to be more interested in the lives of these ‘individuals’, without the trappings of any ideology, and the relationship between them. More often than not, these issues have been a pretext for exploring the fears, apprehensions and hopes of these individuals, who seem to be suddenly thrust into these agitations. As a result, the issues themselves stick out like a sore thumb even when they are handled with solemnity (Compare one of these with a film like Alaipayuthey (2000) where he completely de-politicizes the drama to break down the tale to human levels. The result is a completely bourgeois film, but also arguably the director’s most honest work to date).
Another facet of Mani Ratnam’s writing is his fascination with people working on the wrong side of the law. Right from Velu Nayakar, through Deva, Liaqat, Meghna, Inba/Lallan, Gurukanth Desai and up to Beera, all of Mani Ratnam’s central characters have been exploiting legal loopholes and even defying the legal system. All of them have a moral justification for their deeds and, with the probable exception of Inba (one of the director’s best characters, for he is the product of both an ideology and his free will), all these characters have their own definitions of what is objectively good and what is not. And this moral relativism is what they seem to consider as their redemption and it is what redeems them in the audience’s eyes (What makes the character of Velu Nayakar profound is his inability to morally assess this feature of his). Throughout, Mani’s attempt has always been to, if not construct a holistic and unbiased view of the world, recognize the ‘other’ as human and empathize with their situation. A fan might say that Mani is a silent rebel. But the truth remains that Mani Ratnam has always been an armchair liberal. In nearly every one of the cases above, he leaves the issues unresolved, as if they never existed in his film, and the audience unquestioned. He involves himself deep enough so as to raise questions and make us reflect about the state of the nation temporarily, but keeps himself aloof enough to avoid assuming or giving us responsibility.
But that is not to say that he should be resolving these issues and should propose a direction (which would be too much to ask and which runs the risk of making the films propagandistic – a fatal move for a director who works within the establishment), but the least he could do is test our own moral standings and elicit a complex response from us, as did the last Tarantino movie. Mani is a master of bad endings and even he can’t object to that complaint. Everywhere, he has resorted to either indifference or populist didacticism to restore the film to conventional pop-cinema trajectories. A special note must be made for the ending of Yuva/Aayitha Ezhuthu (2004), despite its crudeness, where, for once, the director throws away the armchair and retains the liberalism. That brings us back to Raavan, which sure does imbibe all these traits above. The villagers in the film are obviously based on the Maoist settlements of central and south-eastern India and their leader Beera is a resistance fighter combating the police and armed forces. The plot points are heavily inspired by Operation Green Hunt, but the region of interest for the director, predictably, remains the triangle of characters at its heart. Oh, but there’s also something going on in the background of these characters. For the second time, after his reworking of the Mahabharata in Thalapathy (1991), Mani Ratnam resorts to an existing mythological text for a template.
[Raavan (2010) Trailer]
Mani Ratnam could have been faithful to the text, playing it out in its entirety and stressing and modulating key sections of it to reveal its inherent sexism and chauvinism and, subsequently, investigate how such a flawed text governs our behaviour. Or he could have stuck, as was his style so far, to the Maoist issue alone and examined the tensions underneath. Instead, Mani relocates the Ramayana into this politically charged narrative, making a few key changes for the sake of authenticity, and compromises both possibilities. Many of the characters in Raavan don’t exist for their own sake, but only to play other characters and to complete an existing narrative framework. Now, this isn’t the film’s biggest problem, but for viewers familiar with the text, it goes on to become monotonous and self-parodying. It is also a bit appalling to see a director like Mani Ratnam going for such banal character mapping. The film’s biggest problem is, however, its viewpoint. Now, the point that the film tries to be making is that there is a Ram and Raavan in every one and that it’s only a matter of context that one becomes the hero and the other the villain. But the whole film shows otherwise. There is not one virtue bestowed upon Dev or one vice assigned to Beera (Being an officer in the police force is the only positive thing about Dev, but Ratnam drains that position of any goodness). It’s all still black and white. The film never moves on to the grey area that it claims it is in. This lack of a moral complexity denies the film any real resonance. It is made clear from the very beginning that Beera is the one the audience needs to root for and Dev is the one to be cursed (The casting only worsens the problem, with Abhishek Bachchan being less easier to hate than the newcomer Vikram). Mani does not balance the sides, as is required, he merely swaps them.
However, the film’s redeeming factor lies in the way it sketches these decidedly good and decidedly bad characters. Dev (Vikram) is the icon of a perfect male god. He is macho, sporting a neatly trimmed moustache, well-built, determined and self-assured. But he also seems to be overconfident of his seemingly infallible masculinity to the point of being sexist. His egocentricity defines the world with respect to himself (the camera gyrates around him quite a few times). He considers his wife and his gun to be fairly interchangeable objects which could be used to demonstrate his power. Mani Ratnam floods the mise en scène with phallic symbols when dealing with Dev. Wielding razors, pistols, sunglasses and cigarettes throughout, Dev is the ultimate patriarch who can control the people around him at will. Or so he thinks. This vanity is his biggest vice. And the disillusionment of that masculine vanity is the cause of his fall. Dev seems to be more interested in killing the man who kidnapped his wife than rescuing her or finishing the mission he is assigned. It is the thought that his wife may have found a better man – that his wife’s fantasies might have outgrown his capacities – that frustrates him more than the fact that she is kidnapped. In that respect, Dev has a lot of counterparts in Hollywood including Dr. Harford of Eyes Wide Shut (1999). What Dev is fighting for is, then, his own potency that has been snatched away by this sociopolitical outcast. He can only do this by killing off any man whom his wife may have considered better. And that is what he sets out to do.
Beera (Abhishek Bachchan), on the other hand, lies exactly at the moral and physical midpoint between Ragini and Dev. He is a man who’s more self-aware and empathetic. He has already realized his own limitations as a ‘man’ the moment his sister was snatched away by the police force some time ago (“It was my fault” he says). Unlike Dev, he is a very progressively thinking person and believes in equality. And unlike that Ram, who can not see anything but lies on Ragini’s face, this Raavan trusts her with his life (and his phallic gun, if you will!). But he is also a man on the verge. He could flip over to the other moral side any time soon. His “jealousy” could turn out to be an obsession. Why, he teeters on the boundary between life and death every day. Each one of his ten imaginary heads might be saying a different thing every time. His temptation of avenging his sister by reciprocally violating Ragini is undone by the fact that both Ragini and his sister are merely variations of each other (This implicit aversion towards “miscegenation” in Raavan is but one of the very many narrative, visual and thematic elements that the film shares with The Searchers (1956), a film that is also set at the native frontier and the film that Raavan wants to emulate). These two people who leapt towards death without fear are the only persons who could stand up to Beera and speak. They are the only ones who prevent him from becoming a Dev. This idea of living on the edge is continually underscored by the film’s visual strategy that employs highly expressionistic landscapes. Beera is usually located on a dark cliff beyond which there are only the white waters of death (and redemption?). He is regularly seen straddling dark geographical structures and the white mist-like atmosphere. Even when he is a mysterious, dark, fearful figure, he is associated with harsh light. Samir Chanda’s production design is noteworthy in this regard. Beera’s idea of redemption is a very subjective one and his vindication seems to be in making Dev realize how morally integral he is, despite his caste, and how unethical Dev is, despite his social and legal standing. Of course, for this he throws his political objective to the wind, as does Mani Ratnam.
Ragini (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan) is the symbol of moral strength purity in the film. She’s the only character in the film who could safely be called “objectively good” (for one, Aishwarya Rai is significantly fairer than the other two men in the film. Politically incorrect? May be. Cliché? Definitely). In some ways, she is the mirror image of Dev, and surely the better half, and repudiates all that he stands for. She’s the only person in the film who gets to see the full picture. She acts fairly rationally and, unlike the men, knows no class, creed or ideology (Amusingly, she almost exclusively moves vertically within the frame throughout the film – plummeting and ascending, skidding and rising amidst the rocky mountains – as if transcending the rigid ‘horizontal’ notions of class). She knows no fear in front of Beera, for she has nothing to be afraid of, unlike Dev and his entourage. Beera is just an arbitrary terror for her. And this independence of hers is what brings Beera to earth from his demigod status. These are very interesting characters, no doubt, but our response to them remains highly one-dimensional. As a result, the film turns out to be as one-dimensional and biased as the text it wants to deconstruct. And yes, the film that Raavan wants to be has already been made ten years ago. And how!
Rating:
June 19, 2010 at 12:23 am
back on the comments section after a long time. feels good. :)
Shrik. First the points that i agree with you on. Forced analogies and forced upon the viewer in the visual narrative (right from the jumping Sanjivini to the nose grabbing of ‘Shoorpanaka’. The similarity between his sister and Ragini (not sure about the Hindi lyrics, but the tamil lyrics in Kattu Sirruki makes an allusion to the same) is possibly one of the highlights of the movie. In a sense this is taken up again in terms of the whole role reversal between Ram and Raavan. While the epic portrays the war as Ram’s rampage against the man who has kidnapped his wife(Talk about a face which can launch a thousand ships), here the story takes the viewpoint that Raavan went after Ram primarily because of the fact that his sister was violated. An interpretation (maybe my overheated brain, maybe Mani’s touch) is the deal about Beera’s sister was brave to choose her own husband and then Ragini is shown all but making her own, a more brave decision if it may be said, of picking Beera over Dev towards the end.
My major disagreement/grouse with your review is that it chooses to disect the 3 characters from a ‘fourth’ person view. Though the movie has been names ‘Raavan’, I think it is best enjoyed and admired putting Raagini as the central character and viewing the happenings from her perspective. From her unflinching loyalty towards Dev and a sense of blind faith in his actions to her final meeting with Beera, the film explores her emotional journey and this is the new perspective which the movie brings forth. Not the generic treatment of Raavan as a Robin hood (yet another analogy hardcoded in the dialogues, rather painfully). Personally not only was hers the most complex character, putting aside Beera’s occasional fits of nonsense as mere acting aids, and Aishwarya’s performance as definitely the best in the movie.
The scene which defines what the movie seeks to convey is the one with the broken Vishnu statue in the background (forced / subtle, the call is yours). Starting with Raagini’s plea to allow her to see only the bad in the bad to Abhishek’s questioning of the common perception of the Lord (fair, no faults etc etc), it seeks to start a debate which our society will never ever want to.
As you might have guessed, I loved the movie, enough to watch the Hindi and Tamil version on the first day of release. :)
Looking forward to your further critique!
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June 19, 2010 at 8:04 pm
Thanks for the detailed comment, as usual, Kutty.
As far as mainstream genre cinema goes, the 4th person’s perspective is no different from the protagonist’s. The ordinary director accentuates the “good” and the “bad” so as to make the protagonist’s (and hence our) choice easier. The great director creates a friction between your perspective and the protagonist’s (during or after the film). Instead of passively acknowledging that the character has done the right thing, you start acting out the story and assessing if what we are supporting is right or not.
For instance, a fine director called Mani Ratnam once wrote a character called Velu Nayakar. His philosophy was purely utilitarian (Nothing’s wrong if it does good to four people, EVEN IF IT MEANS DOING AWAY WITH A COUPLE OF OTHERS). We cheer during the film, but we realize only much later that it is actually unethical. Velu himself realizes this before we do. Why is he not able to accept what he did as purely good? Because it is not.
Isn’t the emotional journey/character arc of Ragini that you mention just an offshoot of Stockholm syndrome? Why does she change? Because she sees how Beera’s acts are justified and how narrow-minded Dev is? I think we’re treading on thin ice here. I don’t think there should be any trouble for a woman to decide between a clearly-bad side and a clearly-good one. The would have been a real test of character if only both Dev and Beera had been balanced out. For all you know, Ragini might be the alter ego of Mani Ratnam – another primitivist armchair liberal, acting upon impulse.
*** SPOILER ALERT
The real trouble would have begun had Ragini gone on to live with Beera, had he not died. Would she still prefer to live among the tribe? Would she have fought their resistance? Or would she flip over again once she sees innocent civilians being killed by the group’s Naxal activities? Mani will never answer that.
The film would have been significantly better had Mani had Beera tell the exact words that Dev tells Ragini Beera did – that she was impure and stuff. That wouldn’t have taken anything away from the moral strength of Beera. It would have only highlighted how he loved taunting Dev. And it would have disturbed our perception a bit. Instead, Mani chooses to show what was already obvious to us – that Beera is a noble man and he didn’t say those nasty things about her. Talk about beating a dead horse.
*** END OF SPOILERS
I’ll probably get back with some more thoughts later. Now, should I watch the Tamil version? May be I know the answer!
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June 20, 2010 at 12:37 am
*** Spoiler alert
Frankly I was also extremely disappointed that Mani killed off Beera at the end, but then as you have put it Mani has never had the courage to go the extra step and has always opted for the safe ending (Alaipayuthey, Ayutha Ezhuthu, Bombay etc etc). Perhaps the only exception was Naayagan, but there again the ‘evil’ was vanquished. So accounting for the Mani paralysis when it comes to the ending, Raagini’s final conversation with Beera and her admission at being let down by Dev and hinting at her falling for Beera are as brave as Mani could get.
With regards to the fight on the bridge, Mani uses that to further underscore his attempt to reverse the epic (Beera giving Dev the lifeline instead of the other way round for instance, which you no doubt would have noticed). When Beera says ‘this is the kind of woman for whom I can either kill you or free you’, he also questions the justification of Ram (allow me to use the mythical characters in this case) use of war and killing of Raavan using the rationale of saving a woman.
*** End of spoilers
With regards to Raagini and Stockholm syndrome, while I do not disagree with it, I do not see how it is a weak point. It is only obvious that a person would understand his/her captor better when being kept hostage. Cannot quite see how this is a defect if that is what you are hinting at.
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June 20, 2010 at 9:34 am
Kutty,
You make a fine point there about the reversal of epic. My only question to Mani: Why bother?
It’s really OK to stick to the epic when it does not hinder your vision (Govinda character was never a problem and he provided much required comic relief too, Priya Mani as Shoorpanakha was OK too). But when faithfulness to the epic obscures our agenda, why go on? For instance, not only was the scene about Vibheeshana’s peace offer an unwanted detour, but it was only employed to underscore how unethical Ram is.
And there’s one more thing about it. Mani includes only characters that fit his denigrating/glorifying scheme. I wonder why he had left off the Guha character. Guha was one person who demonstrates how progressive Ram was.
I have a feeling that Mani found the parallels in the epic very helpful till the halfway beyond which it the epic takes control.
“It is only obvious that a person would understand his/her captor better when being kept hostage.”
Exactly. This is the classic Mani scenario. Reversal of perspective just for presenting another biased view. There is no duality – no moral ambiguity – as as the film claims there is. One could do such a shift of balance given any conflict. Remember Vaanathaippola?
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June 20, 2010 at 10:20 am
How I would have liked to see Mani prune down the story to its bare essentials. A three way drama without anyone else. Beera’s character – a resistance fighter, within and outside – and Dev’s – the hunter – would have been much more human and pronounced. We’d have had our own Dark Knight. A nudge – a pebble on a cliff – is all it takes.
Somehow, it makes me want to watch Thiruda Thiruda all over again.
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June 20, 2010 at 4:53 pm
As I had stated elsewhere, Dev’s character is definitely the least developed of the lot. Could it be, like BR had opined in his review, a case of Mani saying ‘Well, you all know the back story for Ram and his good nature, so let’s see how we can change that perception’. I am not sure how a shot of Beera knocking off villagers’ heads or of Dev being a good samaritan could have substantially altered our perception of each other, given that our perceptions of the characters already carry the baggage from the epics. Their good and bad nature have already been etched into our minds from the childhood readings of the epic. A director relying on a distinct piece of writing to establish his characters ‘a priori’ in some senses is not necessarily a show of strength though.
But I would definitely smoke the peace pipe with you on the fact that this is a rather simplistic, black and white rehash of the epic. Again, when the director is up against nearly 4000 years of pro-Ram arguments, one can not be too harsh on him for utilizing 2 hours to try and stack up as many arguments as possible for the other side of the debate.
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June 20, 2010 at 5:13 pm
Absolutely. That’s another problem that surfaces with the native viewers. The film WANTS us to know it is based on the epic (by assuming that we would support Dev by default I guess). I think the film might have been a far more established film had it
1. Relegated the epic to its utmost background or
2. worn it on its sleeves and confronted it as it is.
Thalapathy got it right I guess.
Peace.
P.S: Interesting passage
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June 20, 2010 at 2:56 pm
About Sita, it didn’t feel to me like Stockholm syndrome at all, it felt more like Raavan was a backup choice. She had feelings for him, surely, but only enough that she would come to him if she was rejected by her Ram.
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June 19, 2010 at 9:53 pm
Speaking of lyrics, “Kodu Poatta” has to be one of the best pieces of writing that I’ve heard in recent times. Highly spirited.
The Hindi lyrics are even more upfront. Lovely.
“Bicchde Picchde Kehke Humko Khoob Udaye Killi Dilli”
Wow. Speaks much more than the film itself.
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June 19, 2010 at 12:56 am
Great writeup!!! So, should I take the plunge & watch this latest from Mani Ratnam, or should I give it a skip as your mixed feelings about the movie suggests?
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June 19, 2010 at 8:06 pm
You can rather watch the Italy vs New Zealand football match. It’s a much more balanced ball game.
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June 20, 2010 at 2:52 pm
I more or less agree with your moral analysis, but didn’t it bother you that the first half was an unjudicious handbook of Darren Aronofsky shots (is expressionistic the right term for it?)?
Also, it’s like the whole of Hindi cinema is going through this Hollywood Bangover/Bollywood Hangover phase, in which the directors are trying to achieve the understated drama of Holvudine cinema but don’t know how to let go of the melodrama of Bolvudine cinema. I found it was perfectly encapsulated in the song where Aishwarya Rai is dancing; if the score had been completely light and high-pitched, that dancing would have created a hypnotic undulating effect, reflecting upon the relationship between the two and at the same time showing us a happy time from their past, but the score felt compelled to tell us that it was ominous by adding a bass thrumming to the scene which took away any enjoyment we could have from this dance.
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June 20, 2010 at 2:57 pm
Oh, and by the way, when I say ‘understated,’ I don’t mean subtle, I just mean not asking as much for your emotional involvement.
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June 20, 2010 at 3:02 pm
Thanks, Ronak, for the much needed clarification. Understated is too generous a word for Hollywood. Yep, I sure did wish that the jimmy-jib had more friction in its joints.
But then, that Khili Re song is so instrumental. That was a small high point in the movie. See how Ragini is sketched, small gestures here and there, as a sensual person. Dev seems to be analyzing and patronizing her more than involving himself. This memory of hers might have exacerbated his tendency to doubt Ragini.
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June 21, 2010 at 12:01 am
I completely disagree about the khili re song, but that’s just a small point here (I liked it being instrumental, but he should have stuck to wind instead of underscoring it with bass string thrumming). Weren’t you irritated by the unjudicious and continuous use of Aronofsky shots? I found it deeply insulting, as if I was supposed to be awed by such continuous “bold” camerawork een though there was no sense to its use.
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June 21, 2010 at 9:23 am
You mean the song itself? Why, it is my favorite song in the album. I’m not sure what you mean by “Aronofsky shots”. But broadly, yes, I did think the cinematography could have been more clinical.
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June 21, 2010 at 9:45 am
Yeah, I think you got my meaning. What I’m talking about is all the wide-angle and extreme colour and odd framing and other such things intended to give us an idea of the chaos inside the character’s mind.
Btw, I just found out that the Tamil version is getting amazing reviews.
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June 21, 2010 at 9:54 am
Really glad to hear that. I’d like to think of this as giving Mani Ratnam some breathing space. And that’s really essential.
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June 20, 2010 at 9:49 pm
A stunning comment section that obviously has brought out some incredible passion. I am obviously behind the eight ball with this film (and this cinema in general) but I can still benefit from this perceptive discussion, and umteenth example of why this site is teh home to a gifted film scholar with a wide range of appreciation and authority.
You have NOT been outside all that much JAFB! Ha!
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June 20, 2010 at 9:51 pm
Of course I do know this is hardly a favorable assessment!!!
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June 20, 2010 at 10:04 pm
Thanks Sam. Mani Ratnam is one of the handful of directors here who is a star. So the passion always soars. Looking forward to what you say about Toy Story – the film that the world seems to have placed next to Citizen Kane!
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June 20, 2010 at 11:54 pm
Interesting review, but I am puzzled by the criticism that the film is “one-sided” and not a corrective to the existing “bias” of the epic text, contrary to the film’s aim — when and where does the film claim that it seeks to operate in the grey zone, i.e. to muddy the waters? The film indicts Dev, and does not indict Raavan at all…and in this it is squarely within the Rathnam tradition (the gangster in Nayakan is akin to a saint; in Kannathil Muthamittal there was no interrogation, at even the most superficial level, of the LTTE; etc. I agree with you that Aayutha Ezhuthu/Yuva had a good — i.e. uncompromised — ending). But what Raavan reminded me of was Dil Se: in both films, Rathnam seems to have retreated from an earlier conformist position uncritically exalting the state (Roja), into, not the nuanced position you seem to suggest he has failed to achieve, but into a deliberate and studied elevation of the anti-state over the “official” discourse of the state. i.e. one might still find this problematic, but I think it needs to be analyzed differently.
In general though, of the “negative” reviews this was my favorite; I liked this film a whole lot though (will be catching the Tamil version later this week):
http://qalandari.blogspot.com/2010/06/it-doesnt-begin-at-beginning-but-like.html
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June 21, 2010 at 9:51 am
Qalandar,
You have put up a terrific review at your site. I’m really happy for Mani Ratnam whenever I read a positive review about Raavan (There aren’t many, of course). Kudos.
“I am puzzled by the criticism that the film is “one-sided” and not a corrective to the existing “bias” of the epic text, contrary to the film’s aim — when and where does the film claim that it seeks to operate in the grey zone, i.e. to muddy the waters? “
For one, to be a bit extra-textual, the stars and the director have been promoting this very facet of the film – the duality and greyness within – from day one. Additionally, the film wants us to know that its exploring the goodness and evil within. Ragini’s character arc is supposed to be experiencing both. I don’t see how the film might look at itself as a purely-good versus purely-evil tale. There wouldn’t be much point or credit to it anyway (Ratnam could have gone completely generic if that was to be) At the risk of repeating myself, I say there is no moral ambiguity that the film. I do disagree a bit on Nayakan there. I think it’s text was rich. As I said above, it does lead to a bitter, complex aftertaste that is missing in Raavan (Consider Nasser’s role in Nayakan. Now that is almost the Dev Mani could not conjure up here).
Reg the state-vs-antistate: Precisely. His support for the anti-state is only skin deep. It;s like Mani wants to picture himself as a socially conscious filmmaker without letting go of his uppermiddle class worldview and safety (not to mention his status as a popular filmmaker). Just look at the political dimension in his films. Roja (patriotism: safe), Bombay (anti-communal preaching: safe), KM, Dil Se (normal people stuck in the whirlpool of sorrowful things: safe) I bet much of Raavan’s text was inspired by A. Roy’s essays. I’d say he was never anti-state. That would have already made him unpopular. He does show the “other side” in his films, but almost always it is left suspended. One can almost hear Mani saying: “The state of the country is so bad. Poor people are made to suffer more. Our national politics is crooked. But that’s the way things are and we have to live with it. At least, we have the leads who live happily ever after”
Thanks for the comment and Cheers!
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June 21, 2010 at 10:27 am
[…] Just Another Film Buff continues to dazzle the film community with top-rank writing that raises the bar in every sense, even when he disents, as he does here with a popular Indian feature, Raavan. The review here belongs in a published volume, and teh comment section is Hall of Fame material. https://theseventhart.info/2010/06/18/ramayana-reloaded/ […]
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June 21, 2010 at 10:54 am
Hey, this review had depth when compared to the shallow ones trashing the movie. I felt that he was trying to portray the way people think of a fight as good versus evil. And we have an epic which has this theme as its core. Mani tried to show the way people dub “Beera/Veera” as Raavan and the STF Dev as “Ram”. And he did a case study of the characters through Raghini’s eyes. I did not understand about the parallels and references to Ramayan. It might be some kind of gospel to people not to dub everything as a fight between good and evil like in the epics (just a speculation).
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June 21, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Thanks for the comment, Anon.
Interesting. I would really have liked if he had remade Ramayana – the actual epic – itself. I think that might have made him concentrate on something concrete.
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June 21, 2010 at 2:27 pm
JAFB,
This is a very fine piece. Enjoyed reading it.
“Everywhere, he has resorted to either indifference or populist didacticism to restore the film to conventional pop-cinema trajectories. A special note must be made for the ending of Yuva/Aayitha Ezhuthu (2004), despite its crudeness, where, for once, the director throws away the armchair and retains the liberalism.”
I’m not sure I get this. How is Aayitha Ezhuthu/Yuva’s ending different? Is it simply because there’s a resolution? But then even Bombay has one. I must admit I don’t find its ending very interesting. For one, the film’s most interesting character is practically abandoned. And then there’s the usual rhetoric about educated people entering politics. (Bharathiraja/Om Puri’s welcome note to the MLA trio is an almost apologetic insert in an otherwise very cheerful ending.)
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June 21, 2010 at 2:52 pm
And great discussion all over in the comments section here. Thanks.
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June 21, 2010 at 4:55 pm
Exciting discussion indeed, Zero. Thanks for continuing it.
But of course. It’s not all too glorious. The best aspect for me about that ending of AE/Yuva was that – as you point out – it was not a cop out (Bombay et al) or a defeatist/complacent (Raavan) decision. Now, each of the three characters represent a particular type of choice of morality and social response – one ‘chooses’ to go ‘crooked’, one ‘chooses’ to be ‘constructive’ and one ‘chooses’ to remain indifferent. The final fight, despite its other faults, on the Basin/Howrah bridge is a fight between choices. I’m really glad that Mani didn’t try to sympathize with Inba or be preachy about his condition. Mani was championing the ideal individual – a man who could choose to do what he want and still have social responsibility – a true left-liberal. I thought it was a really good scratch pad for him and that it would be uphill from then. It was not to be.
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June 21, 2010 at 7:28 pm
[Guess I wanted to use the comment on AE/Yuva as a springboard to better understand your objections to Raavan. :)]
Actually I don’t think Raavan’s ending is defeatist. I think Mani Ratnam’s idea here is to ‘replay’ Ramayana and elicit a different response, not to ‘alternate’ it. (In other words, Ragini wouldn’t go on to live with Beera, Beera will die, etc.) What he does do is elide some of the stuff (quite a bit) in the classical narrative and also intercut it with some flashbacks. The result is not very startling but I found it to be an interesting interplay between oppressive order and absence of order (though the latter is often manifested only by way of dialogue; I’m alluding to how Raavan keeps referring to himself as the other of bhagwan) with the ‘believing’ woman as the witness.
I think ‘alternating’ an epic sometimes misses the key dynamics of the original.* This is what Mani Ratnam did in Thalapathi. You can’t take Karna’s story and give it a more hopeful and progressive ending just like that. It’s all well and good, but does the work really capture any of the dynamics of Karna’s broken relationship with his mother?
* – unless of course one’s ‘alternation’ is so powerful that it truly transcends the epic itself and renders it invalid.
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June 21, 2010 at 8:32 pm
You know, Zero, it seems to me that Mani Ratnam has had this idea of a Ramayana reboot for a long time. May be from even before Thalapathy. That he was just waiting for some material that he could take it through.
What is the point of reboot or reworking of the text if it does not apply to the concrete world today or our way of life? That you’ve understood the text very well and can think beyond it? I’ll give my applause and nothing more.
As you say. he might have had an intention of eliciting a different response to the epic from us. But what’s the point of reassessing an epic without any relevance to the world today? That’s the sole reason Mani seems to have located the Ramayana in to this Maoist template.
The point is that Mani seems to be more interested in deconstructing the Ramayana than in providing a voice to the rebellion. In his quest to “contemporize” the Ramayana, Mani Ratnam lets go of his Maoist template once he is sure that the epic can go on auto pilot. That does not sound any good to me.
Cheers!
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June 23, 2010 at 7:38 pm
Finally saw Raavanan yesterday:
http://qalandari.blogspot.com/2010/06/post-script-to-my-review-of-raavan-in.html
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June 23, 2010 at 8:16 pm
Qalandar,
Thanks for following up and for that detailed description of the difference between the two versions. It looks, from your follow up, that Mani’s casting of the transgenders as Ragini’s keepers – the “rakshasis” – was also an attempt to flip our perception about them. Is this not done in the Hindi version because Mani thinks that the mentality of the Tamil audience towards transgenders is different from the Hindi-speaking audience? Or may be it was just runtime?
Cheers!
P.S: I see you live in the United States. Could you tell me how is the response there to this film, and Indian films in general?
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June 23, 2010 at 10:28 pm
Excellent review, thanks for the write-up.
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June 24, 2010 at 1:25 am
There is a trans-gender person in the Hindi version as well, but has slightly reduced footage (it’s the brother’s wife who keeps watch when Ragini is in that well-like structure; and as mentioned, it’s the brother when she tries to rescue Hemanth — in Tamil, we have a trans-gender person in both scenes).
Re: the US: hard to say. Hardly any non-desis watch Indian films (although, when I saw Raavan in NYC, there were 8-10 non-desi Americans, a pretty big number; normally there are 1-4). The reviews were better than for many Bollywood films (sadly, Raavanan was not reviewed that I know of) — but many Bollywood films do get decent reviews, but in the (condescending?) sense of “hey this is hit and giggle cinema”. Raavan was taken seriously enough to get more substantive reviews (not just “Aren’t B’wood films FUN/SILLY/WHATEVER?!”), and more substantive criticisms. Still not the level of seriousness one sees when an (e.g.) French film is reviewed, but still. Check out the New York Times review (which selected it as a “Critic’s Pick”) or the L.A. Times review…
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June 24, 2010 at 1:42 am
Some reviews from the USA: NYTimes review: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/18/movies/18raavan.html
LA Times Review: http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-capsules-20100618,0,1210817.story
http://www.thebollywoodticket.com/reviews10/strikingimagesshadesofgrayinraavan619.html
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June 24, 2010 at 7:24 am
Thanks for the links. I did read the NYT one earlier, not the others. They seem to play safe.
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June 24, 2010 at 7:21 am
Aah, yes. I can understand that I read an article a month ago on “Bollywoodization” of pseudo-Indian movies like Gandhi. Painful.
Thanks for the reply, Q.
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June 24, 2010 at 8:20 pm
Yes, it is a curious/amusing/exasperating combination of political correctness and condescension that one often sees in the reviews of Hindi films…
I should say that a few years ago, an organization called the “Asia Society” did a special screening of Kannathil Muthamittal. In that sort of context, of course (the arthouse cinema or festival or retrospective), a very large % of the audience is non-desi, and that was true of Kannathil too, perhaps 40-50%. The reaction seemed to me to be quite favorable. I saw a screening of Kasaravalli’s (sp.?) “Dweepa” in NYC too, where 75% of the small audience was non-desi; “Dombivli Fast” (Marathi original of “Evano Oruvan”) also had a ~50% non-desi audience. But this is the arthouse-type crowd, that won’t watch a mainstream B’wood film. A Rathnam straddles the two to an extent, perhaps that and a favorable NYT review explains the somewhat larger number of non-desis I saw when I went to see Raavan…
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June 24, 2010 at 8:23 pm
PS — and obviously, I won’t speak of the full-blown retrospective series. I was lucky enough that there was one of Ray’s films last summer, focusing beyond the Apu Trilogy (although those were part of it too). I had never had a chance to see most of those films in the cinema previously, so it was a real treat. The audience for those was clearly very enthusiastic and appreciative (the retrospective was on films from the first 15 or so years of Ray’s career)… Sadly, many years ago, just before moved to NYC, there was an Adoor Gopalakrishnan retrospective that I couldn’t catch, and that has never been repeated…
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June 24, 2010 at 8:30 pm
Oh, wow. The irony is that I’ve never heard of an Ray (or any other relatively popular Indian filmmaker) retro around here.
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June 25, 2010 at 10:05 am
Even bigger irony: I can buy subtitled Tamil DVDs here, or order them from India, but I can’t have the same shipped to an indian address! Only the un-subtitled Indian market DVDs. So I can get subtitled DVDs, but my relatives in Hyd cannot get sub’d Tamil DVDs…
[Unless the film is released in India itself with subs, as Kannathil and Raavanan were].
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June 25, 2010 at 10:10 am
Haha, talk about market Segmentation. There are also some Indian films that are, plainly, unavailable in India on DVD while they are, abroad
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June 25, 2010 at 6:41 pm
You’ll get a kick out of this: I once wrote to the secretary of the Tamil film federation or some industry group raising the question of subtitles in cinema prints. I asked why Tamil films didn’t have them in foreign prints when Hindi films did. I got a response saying there was no market for subtitled Tamil films. I responded by pointing out that the foreign market DVDs did have subtitles — so they should subtitle the cinematic prints for whoever they intend the DVDs for! No response!
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June 25, 2010 at 6:46 pm
Q,
That’s some adventure! But I think they feel it’s really not worth the effort (even though the investment in this would be peanuts). The Tamil industry might not be explicitly targeting the audience abroad, unlike Bollywood which seems to make films only for metropolitan and foreign cities (Their indifference to rural market may be due to the rise of the Bhojpuri industry). So it’s a part of their scheme to distribute subbed films and DVDs (they even have extras on DVDs nowadays).
Cheers!
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June 28, 2010 at 12:17 am
[…] again before making a final judgement. The easiest course is simply to pass you over to Srikanth on The Seventh Art website since his extended discussion is far better informed than I could manage (and there is a fascinating […]
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June 28, 2010 at 7:35 am
[…] Just Another Film Buff again is headlining what may well be the most successful posting -in terms of comments anyway- at “The Seventh Art” on an Indian film that has sharply divided viewers and critics, and which has generated some fantastic commentary, including that from the exceedingly gifted Qalandar: https://theseventhart.info/2010/06/18/ramayana-reloaded/ […]
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July 1, 2010 at 9:30 am
Saw the Tamil version. Not a big change in response except for a few new observations and the fact that what was crude in the Hindi version feels even more pronounced here. And the Tamil version convinces me why the film should have had Vikram play both Dev and Beera – a tongue in cheek double-action film that might have balanced the film a bit.
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July 2, 2010 at 7:18 pm
This film was a travesty. The amount of talent that has been wasted over a shambolic screenplay is pure travesty. Vikram makes this weird clicking noise, and that was supposed to be his “dark” alter ego? What was Priyamani’s role again? It was Paruthiveeran 2 for her. The only solace was to see Karthik back.
I don’t mind anyone rehashing a classic or an epic, provided there is a little bit of creativity. This movie just proved having an all “star” team is like England at the World Cup. I totally agree with your view that Mani Rathnam is an armchair general. He is not courageous enough to impose his liberal “outlook,” and perhaps not talented enough to provide a “Rashomon” style screenplay.
I don’t know whether you have seen Maqbool. Mani could have taken some hints from remaking an epic from that movie, especially casting. I cannot bear to waste my time on the Hindi version.
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July 2, 2010 at 7:41 pm
Phew, you’re fuming! Glad that you mentioned Rashomon. That is the EXACT kind of movie Raavan should have been – 3 characters, subjective narration, irresolvable tension.
And Karthik supposedly makes a comeback in every film. I’d say he was set for a comeback since his second film.
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July 2, 2010 at 9:42 pm
Aside: I’ve always thought Maqbool was grossly overrated — a very poor reading of Macbeth, not to mention a highly problematic setting of Mumbai’s Muslim underworld among a “high Urdu” cultural milieu that borders on the farcical.
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July 4, 2010 at 8:27 pm
@JAFB, It was a painful experience to undergo and your site was a nice outlet :) I read your review and I thought, nay hoped, that the Tamil version would make more sense. The film was incomplete in so many aspects, yet Indian critics dance like Cherokees around a fire called Mani. And he has the balls to call himself an “auteur”!
@Qalandar, As a non-“Mumbaiite”, I cannot comment on the accuracies of the Muslim underworld nor the portrayal of life in that city, but I was impressed with the casting especially the role of Om Puri and Naseeruddin Shah. Also, a thorough understanding of Macbeth is usually problematic as it tends to be an individualistic perception, and I am sure my interpretation would significantly vary from yours, even if we would agree on the underlying story.
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July 5, 2010 at 10:05 am
After seeing both version of Raavan(an) I am left wanting more… hence, I google the net looking for more web blogs (yep, pathetic ah!).
I feel Mani makes these movies based on parallel cinema to entice us into question general norms and takes our conscious intentionaly to a fantasy land. Historians agree that Ramayana(m) is a collection of stories based on the epic battles between the Aryans and Dravidans.
Noting that Raavan and Raavanan are twins but not identical and is meant for different audiences. The final words from Beera was ‘go ahead destroy me – let the world know who is God and who is the Demon’ while Veera’s final words were ‘you can destroy me – but you cannot take away the happiness I felt in the last 14 days’. Putting this into context with Ramayana(m) is what Mani is trying to say to the Hindi audience and to the Tamil audience, respectively. Mani gets away with this probably because, in theory, Ravan(an) could have said ten different things with his ten different heads when he died….
For me, Raavan(an) is Main’s biggest and boldest political statement to date.
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July 8, 2010 at 9:38 pm
[…] Seventh Art dissects Raavan with surgical precision […]
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February 5, 2011 at 3:36 pm
[…] acts of revenge against a much more diabolical scheme of things (the sort of emotional swing that Mani Ratnam’s latest failed to achieve), Myshkin indulges in much what-is-justice kind of philosophizing – a la […]
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January 6, 2013 at 9:23 pm
[…] (Case in point, his denial that Laal Maati (“Red Earth”), the name of the tribal village in Raavan (2010), has no Maoist undertone is so moot that one is tempted to doubt the truthfulness of his […]
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