Be it Kabir Singh or Ranvijay Singh, alpha males are nothing but grown men in diapers, observes Durba Dhyani after watching Animal.
IMAGE: Rashmika Mandanna and Ranbir Kapoor in Animal.
Okay, so I went and watched Animal.
It was a late night show and I expected to fall asleep, the movie being 3.5 hours long.
What I thought was the abrupt ‘end’ turned out to be the intermission!
But I did stay wide awake and glued to the screen (at least for the first half). In short, I enjoyed the film.
Some of the fun could be attributed to the excitement of watching a movie in a theatre after more than a decade. The whistles, catcalls and constant commentary from the front row audience added to the experience.
Being a last minute decision, we couldn’t get better tickets — the movie is playing to packed houses, after all.
But I must attribute some of the adrenaline rush to the film itself.
Everyone in the movie seemed to be high on cocaine, especially the protagonist Ranvijay Singh, played by the brilliant and charismatic Ranbir Kapoor. The action sequences are pretty rocking and sometimes you want to headbang to the music.
Critics have called the film toxic, gory and misogynistic but I’m not so sure about the last charge.
Of course, you’d do well to leave your brains at home because otherwise, you may become as deranged as the protagonist of the film.
You might end up asking why, for instance, the hero Ranvijay’s homies — burly men entrusted with his protection — lay aside their firearms and sing songs instead, when their leader is being attacked.
Or how a chopper flies unpiloted, while Ranbir and Rashmika Mandanna’s characters are busy making love.
Indeed, the film provides much food for thought, as proven by the reams of praise and criticism it has generated in equal measure.
Everything that could be slammed has been slammed — the hero’s treatment of women, his ‘big pelvis’ compliment for his lady love, the guns in the classroom, the infidelity…
So I am left now with only one unanswered question: Why must all of Sandeep Vanga Reddy’s alpha males wear diapers?
Could it be that these uber men suffer from some kind of an inferiority complex because they cannot menstruate like women?
After all, whatever a woman can do, an alpha male can do better, right?
The protagonist actually gets fiercely competitive about who changes more pads, him or his wife! No way must the woman be allowed to steal his thunder by complaining about period cramps and discomfort. All the whining must be the hero’s privilege.
You changed four pads? I changed 50! Take that, you lowly creature, forever second to man!
Instead of an analysis of the protagonist’s childhood trauma, inflicted by his neglectful father, what is required is a psychoanalysis of the director’s mind.
You will then conclude that critics have got it all wrong.
Vanga Reddy is actually trolling alpha males by harping on their impotence and incontinence.
Be it Kabir Singh or Ranvijay Singh, alpha males are nothing but grown men in diapers. This is the big statement that Reddy makes.
So stop getting needlessly triggered.
Animal is not a misogynistic film at all. It is a feminist work.
