Animal: a gory take on daddy issues
Over the years, many Hindi film classics, like Mughal-e-Azam (1960), Trishul (1978), and Udaan (2010), have explored the dysfunctional parent-child relationship, leaving an indelible mark on the history of Indian cinema. Animal, writer-editor-director Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s latest outing, seeks to explore the same concept, albeit in a much more explosive way. When the Hindi remake of directorial debut Arjun Reddy (Telugu) – the blockbuster Kabir Singh— was criticized by many for being a “violent film”, Vanga had said in an interview, “I will show them what [a] violent film is”.
To that end, Animal delivers.
The Hot-headed Son
Ranvijay Singh Baldev a.k.a Vijay (Ranbir Kapoor) is the hot-headed son of Balbir Singh (Anil Kapoor, a Delhi-based businessman who heads the steel company, Swastik Steels. The family also includes his mother, Jyoti (Charu Shankar), and sisters, Reet (Saloni Batra) and Roop (Anshul Chauhan. After Vijay does something unthinkable in response to his older sister, Reet, getting bullied, Balbir sends him packing to a boarding school. Upon his return, Vijay gets into another fight with his brother-in-law, Varun (Siddhant Karnick). Balbir, in a fit of rage, asks his son to leave his house. But when Balbir is shot at a golf course, Vijay returns to start a brutal, violent campaign to find the enemy.
Spectacular Performances, Ranbir Shines
Ranbir Kapoor puts forth a magnificent performance. His character, Vijay, is angry, violent, stubborn, abusive, and frankly, unlikeable. The actor channels everything the character experiences with complete conviction. In emotional scenes, Ranbir is trembling. The tremors are barely there, which if you don’t notice, doesn’t take anything away from the performance but if you do, it just adds another layer of brilliance. The fact that he performed his own action scenes is the cherry on top.
He is supported ably by Anil Kapoor, who is handed a two-dimensional character; that of a distant, disapproving father. The actor breathes life into this barely etched character by bringing in a hint of softness in some scenes.
Initially, I had trouble following Rashmika Mandanna’s dialogue and she does need to work on her Hindi diction. She does well in the limited number of scenes she has. In one scene, where she fights with Ranbir Kapoor, she shows that she is capable of meatier, more complex roles. She adeptly portrays the gamut of emotions that her character, Geetanjali, goes through in the scene.
Bobby Deol sinks his teeth into his role, but he is shortchanged by the script. I was disappointed by the tiny and rather inconsequential role of the brilliant Triptii Dimri. The rest of the cast is just there.
Soulful music supports a technically superior film
Be it the emotional Papa Meri Jaan in the angelic voice of Sonu Nigam, or the brilliant Arjan Vailly by Bhupinder Babbal or Raghav Chaitanya’s Hua Main, each song is melodious. The songs were placed beautifully in the narrative and worked well with the story. B Praak’s Saari Duniya Jalaa Denge could have been used better. I have to compliment the banger of a background score by Harshwardhan Rameshwar.
The camera work of Santhana Krishnan Ravichandran and Amit Roy must be commended, especially in the action scenes choreographed brilliantly by Supreme Sundar. The art direction by Deepa Chaudhary, Santosh Kotkar, Sagar Mali, and Minal v Uchil, and the costume design by Sheetal Sharma gave the film a stylized look.
A celebration of violence and hypermasculinity
Animal is a rampant celebration of violence and hypermasculinity. “It’s a man’s world,” screams Ranbir Kapoor, and that is the summation of this world that Vanga has built. If in doubt, the dialogues repeatedly reinforce it with multiple references to male genitalia and casual misogyny. The women in this world are mostly props. The movie also puts up what amounts to a token resistance to mass murder but spends more time trying to justify Vijay’s violence.
The movie is essentially a montage of one violent scene after another, with a flimsy plot joining them. It gets into a period of dull monotony post-interval. There is an entire scene, lasting at least two to three minutes, devoted to a rash Vijay has developed. The three-and-a-half-hour runtime could easily have been shortened by at least 20 minutes.
Character development issues
Vijay starts off as an angry young man capable of violence; by the end of the movie, Vijay is an angry middle-aged man capable of violence. Balbir does realize some of his mistakes, but the transition from “I’m your father, therefore I am right,” to a repentant father seems sudden. It would probably have been more organic if the speech of repentance had come right after Ranbir showed him how things went on one birthday. Instead, Balbir doubles down, only to say the words of repentance a few moments later. The transition fails to come across as credible.
A few parting questions for director Sandeep Reddy Vanga: how much did they spend on masks? Why were the masks for the goons even needed, especially since the main person, whose identity must stay hidden, removes it within the first three seconds? Why were those guys singing instead of helping Ranbir Kapoor? Where is the police?