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Friday, January 3, 2025
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BOLLYWOOD I AM
EDITOR'S PICK
Rating: ****
How and where does one begin to describe the infinite satisfaction of watching a
film that emerges from the closet with some arresting and disturbing home-truths
on what goes on when the lights are off? Tiptoeing through the darkest corridors
of the human heart, director Onir in I AM comes up with four stories
on the question of individual, sexual and geo-political identity.
There are no happy beginnings or endings for any of the four protagonists in
I AM. Each one creates a universe of sublime sorrow spearheaded by
an inability to … well, fit in.
Squares among circles? So be it. Onir revels in creating damaged but empathetic
worlds for his four heroes. No, these are super-heroes in their resilience and
determination to tackle discrimination without succumbing to their internal
injuries.
When Afia in the first story, played by the Nandita Das, asks her buddy Juhi
Chawla if she`d lend her brother for some serious sperm banking, Juhi, who we
get to know in the next story is Megha reclaiming her heritage in Jammu and
Kashmir, walks away in disgust. We can`t. We don`t want to.
Artificial insemination gets a cinematic treatment in the story as Nandita meets
her sperm donor (Purab Kohli in a timid mode). As they speak gently into the
night, a warm fertile relationship grows between them in the fertility clinic.
No they don`t fall in love. Where is the space for that to creep in?
The punctuations in the first story are bolder, more aggressive than the other
three, as though Onir wanted to get all the `cinema` in his film out of the way
as early as possible.
For the second story I Am Megha, Onir takes his compelling drama of
the damned to Jammu and Kashmir. The location is treacherously pretty. The
dreaded M-word stalks the streets with unrelenting impunity. Here under the
shadow of militancy, two dignified women, one a Kashmiri Pundit (Juhi) and the
other a local Muslim (Manisha Koirala), interact with restrained annoyance. They
are upset and angry. But they won`t colour the ambience with their prejudices.
Thanks to Juhi and Manisha, who play out the Ingmar Bergmanesque drama in the
deceptive tranquility of the valley, I Am Megha comes to life as a
chamber-piece set in the outdoors.
The third story I Am Abhimanyu on child abuse is understandably a
portrait of acute complexities brought to a virile fruition by the director`s
determined evasion of any self-pity in the abused child`s character. Rather,
Abhimanyu (Sanjay Suri) grows up as quite a manipulator, not sure of his sexual
preferences but sure that he`d milk the ambivalence of his tortured past for all
that it`s worth.
Amazingly Onir goes through the three phases in Abhimanyu`s life, as the abused
child going on to a manipulative adolescent and thence to whining adulthood, in
just about 15-20 minutes of playing-time. Portable epic, indeed!
This story also has the most intriguing array of actors, from Suri to Zain Salam
as the adolescent Abhimanyu to Anurag Kashyap as the sexual molestor, to Shernaz
Patel as the mother in denial and Radhika Apte as Suri`s bohemian sounding-board
who knows she may not be able to have sex with the man she so openly loves
because of his tortured past.
The sexual candour of this episode makes for remarkable viewing. Onir desists
from making any judgement on those who scar the wounded.
The rawest, most guttural and devastating story is saved for the last. I
Am Omar is a story straight out of every gay person`s favourite nightmare.
While making out in a car with his newly-acquired partner Omar (Arjun Mathur),
Jai (Rahul Bose) is accosted by a vulgar homophobic cop.
Abhimanyu Singh as the cop on the bawdy beat comes up with the most bludgeoning
performance in the film. His filthy language and his even filthier intentions
towards the cowering gay man are brought out by the actor with a ferocity and
clarity that provide an entirely new definition to credible characterization.
This story is shot with the quivering conviction of a crime reporter with a
video camera who has suddenly chanced on a scene of atrocity that far exceeds
his call of duty. The enormity of the crime is represented in the beads of sweat
that appear on the brow of the victim of the police atrocity. Rahul is full of
righteous damnation.
I Am can happen to anyone who doesn`t conform. The isolation of the
unorthodox is palpable in every precious breath that the four-storeyed tale
takes. The quartet of stories is backed by the most wonderful team of actors and
technicians. These are not happy stories. How can they be when the
people in them are so intrinsically unhappy?
The challenge for Onir is to make his tortured characters acclimatized to their
pain and suffering without making them look like resigned victims.
Though all four stories are shot by one cameraman Arvind Kannabiran, each one
conveys its own mood, texture and urgency. Though all are joined at the hip,
each story has its own unique rhythm. There are no empty symbolic gestures of
reconciliation in this world of disaffected derelicts.
Each protagonist carries his burden of guilty and grief to the last.
There is no getting away from the despair. But there is no sense of pessimism in
the telling of the stories. That`s the beauty of this little gem of a film. You
get affected. But you don`t lose hope. At the end of the tunnel there is a beam
of light. You can`t miss it.
I AM is about issues and dilemmas that bruise the modern Indian society. Unravelling and exploring these tribulations, the film unfolds many a tale of individuals struggling to find their identity, and uphold their dignity in a world that is callous, cold and unsympathetic.
Shot in four different cities across India, I AM is a fusion of stories where the protagonists share a common dream – a desire to regain their lives, to regain an identity which has been taken away from them.
Success Party of Movie I Am Photo Gallery