It’s reassuring to see that increasingly, films are being made with female protagonists. With no male lead plugged in just because there has to be one. With a strong female lead who takes the story forward; a wronged woman who tries to set everything right and defies the conventions society sets for her. Raveena Tandon’s Maatr is one such.
Except, you either nail this character or you don’t.
It’s almost as if filmmakers nowadays have the one script for female heroes: tarnish her “reputation” through rape or physical violence, have society blame her, and throw questions like ‘can a woman really do anything?’ at her. Then, and only then, will she rise to the occasion and kick butt.
Maatr tries that, plus a little gang rape, murder, revenge, and more murder. And frankly, I’m not buying. There’s nothing new that this film offers. Albeit brutal, films from the ’80s and ’90s had the same storyline. If anything, Maatr is full of holes and unanswered questions. And dishearteningly enough, the music by Fuzon (the Pakistani Sufi rock band behind the lovely song ‘Mora Saiyaan‘) is completely wasted and unnecessary.
For a movie that hopes to create an impact, there’s little that moves you.
*****
Vidya Chauhan is a teacher at a posh school in Delhi. She and her 15-year-old daughter are heading home one night. The Chief Minister’s son and his drug-addled friends chase them and cause an accident, leaving both mother and daughter incapacitated. Both are raped, the daughter is killed, then they are dumped on a random road in the middle of nowhere.
The police do nothing to get them justice. Her turd-of-a-husband blames her, because “she took a wrong turn”. He leaves her, and she’s left to handle the situation on her own. In an awkward montage with Fuzon’s music, we watch Vidya training to become physically fit, so that someday she can fight the rapists herself.
The film shows little interest in the process of her transformation, or the details of how she plans her revenge. Worst of all, her grieving is apparently too unimportant to dwell on. After one rushed sequence to generate audience sympathy, the film quickly moves to the vengeance part. Raveena is now the angry woman and will not let anybody stop her.
One by one, she avenges the rape and death of her daughter. Except, she does it so conspicuously that we’re left fuming at how she gets away with so much despite everybody watching her. Everything is conveniently set up for Vidya to exact her revenge – another reasons why the story leaves you unmoved.
And if it wasn’t the convenient turn of events, it would be the far-fetched, terribly long ending. The film is pacy enough to leave unanswered questions, yet slow enough when it comes to depicting gratuitous physical violence.
*****
Recommended
There was so much Maatr could have done with a story so disturbing and told so many times. With a plot eerily similar to Kaabil, Akira, and the 1988 film Zakhmi Aurat, Maatr could have easily steered clear of overused clichés. But it doesn’t. Thus, it ends up looking like a caricature of a rape-revenge saga. And even though you root for the female lead, you mostly root for the film to finish fast.
For an in-depth look at Bollywood’s depiction of “strong” female leads, here’s: Bollywood And Its Women – How Good Are They, Really?
*****
The Maatr review is a Silverscreen original article. It was not paid for or commissioned by anyone associated with the movie. Silverscreen.in and its writers do not have any commercial relationship with movies that are reviewed on the site.