Indian 2 is a very challenging film. It challenges Indian 1’s legacy, the audience’s tolerance, and itself on the grounds of how much uglier it can get. The film is a cringe fest with a turn off every second minute of the runtime. You see the cartoon ‘common man’, and you’re already tired of dealing with the absurdity but it tests you with the performative characters of Siddharth, Priya Bhavani Shankar, Jagan and Rishikanth – well, you sit through that as well, thinking ‘poga poga pazhagidum’ but Shankar bombards you with a garuda puranam-esque killing spree combined with artificial and insufferable dialogues.
For a film that is so ‘political’, this is one of the most insensitive and politically incorrect films to have been released in the past decade. It is neither progressive nor revolutionary as it carries ideals of the 90s. Shankar continues to blame the common people, daily-wage workers, Dalits, and domestic workers for the downfall of the country.
He blames rag pickers for unclean streets and calls them corrupt for being ‘inept’ at their job and shames the common man for availing subsidized items and compares that with the large-scale corruption that industrialists and politicians do. Does Jeyamohan, Shankar, or Kamal Hassan who claim to ‘change the society’ not understand that sanitation workers are forced to toil in the most unhygienic, inhuman and toxic environment & are severely underpaid?
Not to forget the Calendar Song which is an unnecessary sequence of skin show of a bunch of barely-dressed women dancing for the male gaze. Close up shots of these semi-naked women is an added pain to the already boring film but Indian 2 passes off as the perfect sequel to Indian 1, this way, which also had extremely crass, disgusting and perverted “jokes” on women’s bodies.
Almost all serious scenes are pretty laughable due to their absurdity but that’s when Shankar chooses to fit in extremely problematic, casteist and homophobic ideas into the narrative. Indian thatha uses varied forms of punishment to kill the wrong do-ers of the society and one such ‘punishment’ is turning a cis man into a transman – an unnecessary transphobic scene of him wearing bright red lipstick and kohl coupled with a feminine body language. This is followed by another casteist scene where Kamal calls a bunch of online youth who are dark skinned, adorned with funky, coloured hair, speak the North Madras slang of Tamil and bejeweled with Bob Marley inspired accessories, as ‘Average’ Mani. He goes on to shame these men who use Facebook walls as ‘evolved vandals’ who once scribbled on the walls of public washrooms.
Social media, as a space, isn’t exclusive for the elites. Practising ostracism and alienation in a space that’s equal to all and forbidding the minority from entering into it is crass and ill-minded. Siddharth once posted on Facebook walls, Kamal announces his politics opinions on Twitter – Indian 2 as a film believes social media is the tool to revolution but where is alienating an entire community and making social media, a closed platform going to get the country, if not back to its regressive, casteist and heavily patriarchal structure?
The film has good action choreography and Kamal, as usual, pulls off the character well. Anirudh, whose background score usually elevates exalting scenes, doesn’t do much of a job here because all scenes are equally bad. Vivek and Nedumudi Venu as partial AI characters are quite refreshing to watch but they do not offer much comical relief either. Amongst overall dull visuals, certain frames and shots are eye-pleasing but the screenplay tends to fall flat and repetitive, following a set template.
Shankar’s films are always known for their ‘bramaandam’; and so the mistakes of Indian 2 are grand as well. The gold used in the sets are shady looking, Kamal’s makeup as an old man is pretty inconsistent and rabidly done; Siddharth, Priya Bhavani Shankar, Rakul Preet, Rishikanth and Jagan have very caricature-ish tropes who seem very distorted from reality. Bobby Simha and SJ Suryah, however, score well in whatever scenes they appear in.
Overall, Indian 2 is a very outdated film with each scene getting stretched to the maximum. Anniyan-ification of Indian ‘Thatha’s’ actions and him speaking a different language while attacking the villains of each state seems like an unnecessary take on ‘Pan-Indianism’ which doesn’t connect well either. You also do not care for ‘Indian’ to kill the villain because you don’t even know what the villains did. None of their crimes are established properly – unlike Indian 1, where you want the government officer to die for abusing Manorama, or the doctor who refuses to treat a burnt Kasturi until given a bribe.
Indian Thatha may be 102 years old but the Indian 2, with its regressive ideals of transphobia, casteism, secessionism and misogyny is definitely older.
Rating – 1.5/ 5
