Mani Ratnam 2010 India
Starring: Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan, Vikram, Govinda, Priyamani, Nikhil Dwivedi, Ravi Kishan
A real life couple acting alongside each other isn't always a good thing. When it works, as with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton's frequent pairings, the chemistry can make for unmissable intensity and epic romance but in other cases, where say a desperately wanted actor throws their drawing power about and gets their other half a decisive role, the finished product can feel like a forced vanity project. In Bollywood several couples have worked opposite one another with mixed results - notably Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bhaduri - but in modern times no duo are better or more prevalent than Abhishek Bachchan and Aishwarya Rai, the son and daughter-in-law of the former. In the last decade or so they've appeared on film together as love interests, cop and criminal respectively and even a married couple but in Mani Ratnam's 2010 updating of the Hindu epic The Ramayana, Raavan, they add a new twist to the list. Here Bachchan is Beera, a Robin Hood-style criminal both benevolent and brutal. Loved by the poor and assisted by women, children and the elderly in the forest villages he controls but considered a terrorist by the police he lives below the radar, is attributed with the name of the title because of the public's multi-faceted viewpoint of him and takes on injustice even if means breaking laws, chopping off hands and setting people on fire. Rai is his captive Ragini, taken to draw her husband, Superintendent Dev Pratap Sharma, into a showdown, the reasons for which are gradually revealed and have a core in notorious true crimes of recent years. Far from being just the helpless woman in peril or the hot-to-trot lover of both men however Ragini is a pleasingly well-rounded and complex character, believably frightened but defiant, sympathetic but fighting, brimming with a refusal to be resigned to her fate. In one scene she attempts suicide by jumping from a cliff without flinching purely to deny Beera control over her death. Later her resolve (but not her honour) breaks down as she finds herself torn between those society dictates that she respect and the man she has been taught to abhor but she never renounces her love for her husband, the growing relationship between Beera and herself closer to Stockholm Syndrome and based more in a mutual respect and regard for one another than anything romantic. As ever Rai excels, running the gamut of emotions and bringing an authenticity to Ragini's plight. Bachchan is for the most part more bombastic and credibly psychotic but with a good reason, the person Beera is expected to be and the façade he keeps up until he's alone and with someone he trusts when he becomes quieter and more thoughtful. And for once the policeman of the film is merely a secondary character, there mainly to provide context for Beera and Ragini to bond. It's a lucky coincidence because the actor playing him, the Tamil actor Vikram, is far less skilful than his co-stars, competent as a principled tough cop but showing little emotion otherwise. It's sort of excusable because this was his Bollywood (Hindi) debut and he wasn't acting in his native language but you still feel he could have done more. Interestingly when a Tamil language version of the film was made simultaneously alongside this one he played Beera with Rai retaining her role as Ragini and Prithviraj as Dev. Director Mani Ratnam meanwhile is an odd figure; his camera spirals, snakes into pipes, shoots through the burn holes left in a photograph by a cigarette; he's a veteran of some years but is clearly still excitable, idiosyncratic and at times wildly undisciplined with a real talent for producing images of startling quality. One sees Ragini after her cliff dive caught in a large tree branch, unconsciously impaled but at peace. Another has Beera put his arms around Ragini, not touching her but encasing her body, daring her to struggle, while a later scene has Beera taunt an enemy with a razor politely asking which facial feature he wants removed before calmly shaving the man's head. The next time we see the victim he's tied to a makeshift cross and buried up to his neck in sand. Ratnam's musical sequences too are unusual, not existing simply as distracting and out-of-place breaks from the drama but as almost disconnected moments with gorgeous interpretative dances closer to teasing fights with music by soundtrack maestro A.R. Rahman. The middle section of the film is slightly baggy and less enjoyable than the period it follows though but the unexpected and uncommonly downbeat, reflective finish improves things no end. As a whole everyone involved has done better but, despite its flaws, I'm still pretty impressed.
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