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MARDAANI DID MORE THAN JUST ENTERTAIN
I’ve walked these squalid lanes, heard brothel madams bark orders and pimps keep a watchful eye from street corners on young girls with painted faces and tight clothes dotting the stretch. None of these girls I spoke to were doing it out of choice and there was no escape from this suffering of being trafficked in the name of love, job or city life. I was eager to watch Mardaani but I also had my apprehensions. About stereotypes and cliches. But what followed was an honest, heartening journey through that dreary world, very close to what I had been learning and writing about.
Rani’s heroism as Shivani Shivaji Roy was infectious. All that swearing and kicking ass might have felt forced otherwise, but here she induced a sense of thrill, of living vicariously through her, saying and doing things we normally wouldn’t. The film did try hard at times to walk the tightrope of reality and drama but what mattered in the end is that it had its heart in the right place.
Mardaani did much more than just entertain. It spoke to me, about the need for greater insight into something so challenging and uncontrolled in our times.
It spoke to the family of four, seated next to me in the hall, reacting at every high and low. It spoke to a front row of boys who made my blood boil with their claps and whistles at inappropriate moments till Shivani Shivaji Roy managed to reduce them to silence in the end.
mardaani Makes me believe in the system
Every bit of Mardaani worked for me. What I loved? A no-nonsense Rani. A character that is neither a glamourised version nor an art-house uber feminist, idealism spouting character. How refreshing it was to hear “Yaar, sir ki biwi ko koi shopping karao!” That scene where Rani slaps the goon, once for each section of law he’s broken. The way she works out... I’ve taken up my oft-abandoned exercise regimen inspired by Rani. I may not fit into my favourite Bisou Bisou denims and I don’t care, but I want to be fit enough to slap a six-footer. A film which does not extol “virtue”. The fact that it suggests in no way that getting into the flesh trade is the end of life. The way it encourages people to step up and give it back. The way there are no super-shero movies and the way it makes me believe in the system, in the strength of every person.
mardaani showed a woman in her entirety
Women tend to take things personally, emotionally. After a lifetime of being told that this was a bad thing, a sign of weakness, I almost clapped for joy when Shivani Shivaji Roy says that if the police force investigated every case like it was personal, no little girl would be trafficked in India.
What worked for me the most was that Mardaani showed a woman in her entirety... she’s strong as steel but also an emotional creature, her heart aches even as her nerves rise to the challenge. And the whole idea of Shivani subverting the oft-repeated line “Yeh India hai” to her advantage in the end made the many things wrong with our country slightly more bearable. We need more films like Mardaani, character-driven, cause-specific and no-nonsense. Bolly has the power, it should use it well.
Also, seeing the complacent caramel popcorn-munching, Diet Coke-belching multiplex crowd actually clapping for a cause was an emotional experience in itself.
mardaani makes you sit back and think
Mardaani is a film that makes you keep your popcorn tubs aside and sit back and think. Initially, the title irked me as the whole notion of calling a strong woman man-like is utterly preposterous. But hats off to Pradeep Sarkar for not just giving us a film with a social message, but one that also strikes a chord with everyone out there. Rani Mukerji’s character was extremely inspiring and for those women who are oblivious to their own strengths, this sure is an eye-opener. It is true that we do not need a movie to make us feel proud of the fact that we are women, but when the end credits roll, you cannot help but smile as you wipe away a tear and think that we can do anything we put our minds to.
mardaani had a message without being preachy
Besides Rani’s natural acting, the film was kept very realistic with good editing and no dance sequence. I loved Mardaani because the movie had a strong message without being too preachy. I loved the scene where Rani walks away after beating up the villain and leaves him to the girls. Many people in the hall put their hands together and clapped and cheered. I joined in.
you will be stirred not to stay silent
Shivani Shivaji Roy is not a cop. She’s a supercop. She cuts ropes around her ankles as quickly as she ties her niece’s hair. She believes in fitness as much as fitrath. At the end of Mardaani, you want to be Shivani, angry enough to do something about the “India” we have created. You will strain your neck to read the trafficking numbers that roll before the credits. And you will be stirred not to stay silent. As the hall was emptying out after the film, an elderly lady sitting in my row in the cinema hall had difficulty getting up. An impatient man behind us said, “Can you please move so we can leave?” Around three-four of us ladies in between turned around to glare at him, ready to raise our voices. Call it ‘Mardaani’.
some moments that make mardaani a wow watch. Spoiler alert!
I rarely get involved in the film I am watching. Put it down to the immunity I have developed through years of sitting through terrible films as a film reviewer. But that changed a bit with Mardaani. As Rani Mukerji’s tough cop Shivani Shivaji Roy went pow-wow and threw punchlines, I found myself smiling and then even cheering and clapping through much of the 114 minutes of the Pradeep Sarkar film. Yes, you will cheer through them, too.
• The film opens with Shivani Shivaji Roy and her group of trusted aides walking into a chawl in disguise to catch a gangster. They let loose a cage of mice into his room and barge in as soon as the door opens. What follows is a barrage of abuse and fists.
Punch: Shivani slaps the gangster left, right and centre, even raining a few kicks on him. Her favourite words for him? ‘Chooran’ and ‘Ch***ya’
Punchline: After the daredevil operation, when Shivani is reprimanded by her boss over phone for risking the lives of civilians, she turns to her subordinates with a smile and says: “Sir ki biwi ko koi shopping karao, re!” (Read: make her stop giving him a hard time so that he stops giving us a hard time).
• As a gang of goons vandalises a shop, Shivani asks her team member to record it all on his phone. She struts into the mess and as the leader of the goons threatens her, she rains a stream of slaps on the stupefied man, one for each section of the Indian Penal Code she can arrest him under.
Punch: When the man falls after being slapped a few times, she pulls him back to his feet, slapping him twice with: “Abhi do aur section baaki hai!”
Punchline: As the man fumbles with his phone to call his boss, our Mardaani goes: “Apne Pappa ko mera naam theek se bol. Shivani Shivaji Roy, senior inspector crime branch unit 3. Ukhaad ukhaad jo ukhaadna hai!” Yes, and one more slap.
• Running through the busy thoroughfares of Mumbai, Shivani chases two men on a bike who, moments ago, had fatally shot a witness in her car. She runs behind them, pulls the one riding pillion to the ground and leaves her subordinate to grapple with him, all the while continuing her chase on foot.
Punch: She finally pins him down by launching on him from the bonnet of a car parked nearby. Then whack, thwack, boom, bang!
Punchline: As the man is gunned down by an unseen sniper just as she is about to question him, Shivani lets the F-word rip. Not once. Not twice. Many times.
• Shivani’s first encounter — over phone — with trafficking kingpin Karan Rastogi (Tahir Raj Bhasin) is electric. Cool and composed, she matches him barb for barb, addressing him as “Junior” and “Under 19 team ka 12th man”.
Punchline: When Karan asks her to think over her decision of not withdrawing from investigating the trafficking case, she hits back with: “You think it over, Junior. Kyunki jis din main tum tak pahunch gayi tum sochne ke kaabil nahin rahoge.” Taaliyan!
• Katyal, a man from Karan’s gang, is now on Karan’s hit list. In the dead of the night, his assassin drives the unsuspecting Katyal to an abandoned brick kiln and points a gun at the back of his head. Cue for Shivani and co. to enter.
Punch: Just as the assassin is about to pull the trigger, the sound of a gunshot breaks the calm, but Katyal isn’t the victim. He turns to see that the assassin has been shot in the head, courtesy Shivani who gives him a winner of a smile.
• Karan calls up Shivani at the crack of dawn, threatening her with dire consequences.
Punchline: Shivani to Karan: “Itni subah call kiya tu ne? Call centre mein kaam karta hai kya?”
• Gagged and bound, Shivani is left alone in a hotel room when minister Taneja enters. Shocked on seeing him, she asks: “Kya aap mera sach-much rape karne waale hain?” “Jhooth-mooth ka rape kaise karte hain mujhe pataa nahin,” he smirks and sits beside her.
Punch: Fishing out the pocket knife she had hidden in the sole of her shoe, Shivani attacks Taneja with it. As he falls back, she breaks his right hand in one swift motion and then proceeds to smash him.
Punchline: “Rape karega tu?” Shivani bellows and then kicks him, well, where it hurts the most.
• The penultimate scene has Rani leading Taneja, Karan and the rescued girls into a room in the same hotel and then challenging Karan to a fight. What follows is one of the best fight scenes you would have seen in a Bolly film in recent times.
Punch: Displaying her knowledge of Israeli martial art Krav-Maga, Shivani plays smart, hitting Karan and bringing him down on more than one occasion. When he has very little life left in him, she invites the trafficking victims to take over.
Punchline: In the middle of the fight when Karan tells Shivani that he will get away easily if arrested because “Yeh India hai”, she rains down a few more kicks and punches on him, saying: “Yeh India hai… yahaan pe pachaas log kisi ko raaste mein pakad ke maarte hain to usse public outrage bolte hain… kabhi kabhi usse Lokpal Bill bhi bolte hai.” Take that!
Priyanka Roy
Which Mardaani punch/ punchline did you cheer the most? Tell t2@abp.in
