The White Tiger : A review

White Tiger, blue moon, albino alligator, purple carrot, double yolk egg - all these vagaries of nature catch our eye because they are rare. Aravind Adiga's novel The White Tiger bowled over the Booker prize judging panel in 2008. It was a rare page-turner, presenting a tight and perceptive portrayal of the emerging India of the early 2000s. Other than being mightily impressed just like the Booker panel I do not remember much about the story I had read 10+ years ago, that was till I watched Netflix's movie The White Tiger. 

I remembered that even while reading the book it had felt like it was gripping movie material for western audiences if it can be produced in English, the same language the book is written in. Just like Dickensian tales that never tire the audience even after repeat adaptations in different mediums, The White Tiger is like a modern day David Copperfield. It belongs to the same bildungsroman genre with the dark Victorian London substituted by the frenetic and murky 21st century New Delhi and northern India. A dog eat dog world where the poor has to overcome classism (and caste) to make something out of themselves.

And the most important reason why it has to be made in English and not in Hindi or any other regional Indian language is because poverty porn sells well to a western audience. [Parasite, has entered the chat.] It might even have a chance at being an Oscar contender in the regular category (and not in the best foreign film category.) If you think about other foreign films in the recent years that made it to the best picture category you shall see the light - Slumdog Millionaire, Roma, Parasite.

I can't say the poverty and the class/caste-divide The White Tiger depicts is not real. It it is not the India I am familiar with. I got lucky in the lottery of life. Salaam Bombay is real to people who live in the red light district of Mumbai, so is Netflix's recent home-brewed poverty porn classic - Hillbilly Elegy. But how many Americans I know and interact with everyday thinks that the U.S of A is as it is shown in Hillbilly Elegy? Zilch. Ordinary lives do not make interesting movies, we will leave it at that.

Adiga dedicated his book to his friend Ramin Bahrani whom he met during his student years at Columbia University. Bahrani has written the dialogs and directed The White Tiger as faithfully as he could, reproducing the narrative in his signature indie movie style. Bahrani, an Iranian-American director, born and brought up in the US somehow captures the simple and raw humanist docudrama vibes of Iranian cinema in all his films. He is well known for using raw natural talent, many with no previous acting experience as protagonists and placing them in a documentary-like story line (refer: Goodbye Solo) which is exactly what he does in The White Tiger too. It is helpful that Adiga's novel is indeed documentary-ish in its presentation - written as eight long emails from the protagonist, Balram Halwai to the Chinese premier at the time, Wen Jiabao. 

The cast is led by the newcomer Adarsh Gaurav as the protagonist and supported by the reliable and experienced Rajkummar Rao and Priyanka Chopra Jonas. 

Priyanka and Ava DuVernay are also two of the executive producers of the movie. Appreciate your choice ladies, it is a movie that needs to made. While the characters and the background scenery are specific to India, it is a satirical take on neoliberalism, the invisible global economic epidemic, which is normalizing greed and narcissism all over the world.

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Saat Khoon Maaf

Priyanka Chopra must have a very good manager or the girl has got brains. Her last few outings as a leading heroine could be considered as paranormal phenomena in a male-centric Bollywood. I go by the Merriam Webster definition of ‘paranormal’ – something that’s not scientifically explainable. Or how else could you explain Fashion, What’s your Rashee or this one I am attempting to review – 7 Khoon Maaf.

Fashion won her the national award for best actress, maybe she didn’t have to do much acting in that role being a fashion model herself, it was a strong performance nevertheless. Then comes What’s your Rashee and 7 Khoon Maaf – two movies in which the strong female character had to carry the bulk of the film and to my surprise Priyanka shouldered the burden competently.

I am not a big fan of Miss India being a platform for launching future Bollywood leading ladies, much like using the Kalathilakam award as a short-cut to becoming a Malayalam movie heroine. Whether I like it or not, both these have served as vehicles of entry to filmdom for many of our heroines.

When Priyanka Chopra launched her Bollywood career courtesy of  her Miss India title, there were several others attempting the same route – Yukta Mookhey, Lara Dutta and Celina Jeitley to name a few. I had thought Priyanka was not the typical Bollywood beauty and therefore will be ousted in no time. But time and Priyanka’s career management has proven me wrong and here we are at 7 Khoon Maaf.Adapted from a Ruskin Bond story. Susanna’s Seven Husbands and directed by Vishal Bharadwaj, 7 Khoon Maaf produces a slew of adjectives in my mind – in no particular order they are - odd, sensual, imaginative, remarkable, different, dark, comical and interesting.

With Vishal Bharadwaj you can always expect a movie a little off the beaten path, usually adapted from a literary work. It is nice to see Ruskin Bond’s work in Bollywood. But the one who really hit the jackpot is definitely the lady who has occupied most real estate in this review – Ms.Chopra. She gets to act with six different leading men – ranging from Neil Nitin Mukesh to Naseeruddin Shah.

Much of the charm of the movie is its story, the anticipation of who and what will the background of Susanna’s next husband and the next husband and the next.Like other Vishal Bharadwaj films, it is not what the mainstream Hindi audience expects and therefore I believe there will be more who won’t like this movie and than those who will. It didn’t do well at the box-office, had Mr.Bharadwaj been more money-conscious he’d have cast ShahRukh Khan as one of the seven, but then again would he agree to be 1 in 7 when he is really number 1 and only?

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