Rating: 2 stars
The biggest problem with the Kangana Ranaut-directed Emergency is its title. Based on its name, one would assume it's a deep dive into one of the darkest periods of contemporary India's history. And given the Political stance of its lead actor and director, one would think it's a take-down of a powerful leader whose legacy is as polarising as it is inspiring.
Both assumptions are wrong.
Emergency is not as much an exploration of the shocking period when democracy died in India as it is a biopic of Indira Gandhi, the Prime Minister at the time. The movie aims to paint with a broad brush on a wide canvas which is its biggest failing but more on that later.
It's hard to review Emergency without considering its circuitous route to the theatres. It was controversial, offended multiple groups, survived a near-ban and struggled for a censor certificate. One does not know the impact of the censor-imposed cuts on the final edit so it's best to judge the content with a neutral lens.
The plus point: Emergency shows both the positive and negative aspects of its protagonist; refreshing in an industry that reduces biopics to one-note hagiographies. A person like Gandhi - or any other politician in any part of the world - is never without faults but Hindi films tend to view their subjects with a rose-tinted glass. The biggest recent example is that of the Pankaj Tripathi-starrer Main Atal Hoon, Atal Bihari Vajpayee's biopic that was a boring and fawning tribute to the late PM. Perhaps it was easier to paint Indira Gandhi in black, white and grey tones since she was, after all, a leader of the party currently in opposition in India. Nevertheless, from the cinematic point of view, the latter approach is way more interesting than the former.
Therefore, given the massive impact Gandhi had on Indian history, why does Emergency feel like a trying-to-be-a-serious school play rather than a refined, complex portrayal of power and corruption? It's simply because, Kangana, instead of zeroing in on the period of Emergency, the circumstances that led to it and its repercussions, makes the film a story of Indira Gandhi from childhood to death.
The film begins with a young Indira (with a prosthetic nose) being ill-treated by her aunt. As is routine in Bollywood movies these days, her father, India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, is shown as a weakling and Indira solemnly vows to not be like him. Thereafter, Ritesh Shah's screenplay moves as if it's on steroids. Her failing marriage, accession to the top position in the Congress party, rise to the position of Prime Minister, her challenges as a woman in politics, and her self-realisation - all happen at breakneck speed, leaving no impact whatsoever.
The story then, thankfully, dedicates time to one of Gandhi's biggest successes - the 1971 war against Pakistan. However, in this segment, the screenplay lavishes love on Sam Manekshaw (Milind Soman), giving him a hero's entrance accompanied by dramatic music. Gandhi, on the other hand, is portrayed as uncertain, with none of the late PM's steely determination coming through, despite scenes showing her famous interactions with US President Nixon and Henry Kissinger.
In the second half, the action shifts to the Emergency, Sanjay Gandhi's (Vishak Nair) excesses, the nuclear tests, her political fall and rise, and finally the tragic events of Operation Bluestar and her assassination in 1984. Packing all of this into a 2.5-hour film feels rushed and would have best suited a web series like The Crown. It's baffling why the filmmakers chose a biopic format for such a sprawling story.
The treatment lets it down further. The film works in patches - the Emergency atrocities, the creation of Bangladesh and Indira's negotiations with world leaders are strong but overall it lacks depth or finesse. The only time Kangana goes for depth is when she takes a Shakespearan route of Gandhi being scared by her own image in the mirror - it looks weird.
More weird are the utterly ludicrous songs. Characters of Jayprakash Narayan (Anupam Kher), Atal Bihari Vajpayee (Shreyas Talpade), Jagjivan Ram (the late Satish Kaushik), Sam Manekshaw (Soman) and Gandhi herself break into a song in Parliament, they lip-synch while undergoing prison torture and sing while motivating troops. Strange!
A lot of the sequences are so in-your-face that they seem amateurish - as if the script was an exercise in ticking off the Wikipedia aspects of Gandhi's life and rule.
But what still makes Emergency one of the better biopics of Bollywood are the pace and performances. The supporting characters, be they opposition politicians played by Kher, Talpade and Kaushik or Mahima Chaudhury, who plays Pupul Jaykar, are great - except when they sing. However, they are all side notes meant to praise or pull down the central character.
As the film's beating heart, Ranaut's performance leaves you with mixed feelings. She's undoubtedly nailed the look with those exquisite saris and famous patch of white hair, but her weak accent and confusing body language do not mirror Gandhi. Whatever your feelings about the politics of the stateswoman, her charisma and strength could not be denied. Here, most of the time, she is shown in extreme close-ups, chin twitching, lips quivering with a forlorn look in her eyes - far removed from the“Iron lady” descriptions of history books. If the intention was to show her as a strong but vulnerable personality, it falls flat. Ranaut is amazing in many scenes but overall, the lack of consistency in the characterisation impacts the performance.
Her performance as Indira Gandhi could have been one for the ages but she perhaps deserved a better story and director. Oh the irony!