Visaranai,
a Tamil film that was released in the beginning of this year, is the official
entry from India for the Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film
category. Whether the film will eventually be shortlisted for the award is
anyone’s guess. However, one cannot discredit the effect the film will have on the
audience in depicting the state of affairs in our police system. It is
interesting that despite the film being a statement against the State
machinery, it went on to win the national award last year. This suggests that
the State is open to critique itself which is a positive sign.
Director: Vetrimaaran
Video Clip
The film is based on the novel Lock Up by M. Chandrakumar. It narrates
how four labourers are wrongly implicated by the police in a high profile
robbery case in which they are under immense pressure to find the culprits. However,
things dramatically change when the four labourers are saved by a Good
Samaritan. But, as fate would have it, the Samaritan himself eventually traps
them into committing more crimes and thus leads them into doom in the quagmire
of corrupt nexus among the police the bureaucracy, and the political
establishment.
The film is made in
utmost simplicity sans any superfluous embellishments. However, the precise
narration and editing help in putting across the narrative quite matter-of-factly.
The entrails of the police system are exposed in such a way that no one will
argue that our police system works any better than that. The betrayal and the
violence that emerge at tandem make the film gory in parts, but when one considers
the overall objective of the film, one cannot see the film otherwise. The
police system in India has its own complexities and pressures. The long desired
police reforms are yet to see the light of day. Till then films like Visaranai
will have a field day in exposing it threadbare.
- Melwyn Pinto SJ
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