Review: ‘Assi’ reaches for shock treatment to talk about rape culture
· Scroll
She lies on the ground, barely alive after the gang rape from the previous night. The image of her in a long shot, struggling for breath and semi-clothed, is enough for us to understand what she has been through.
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But it’s not enough for director Anubhav Sinha. He wants us to see exactly how Parima (Kani Kusruti) got there. How four men dragged the school teacher into their vehicle. How they took turns. How they recorded their assault. Parima suffers horribly; so do we.
Assi proceeds on the principle of shock treatment. The only way to shake viewers out of their presumed apathy over rape is apparently to pick an extreme instance of this crime and show it in excruciating detail.
The Hindi film’s title refers to the number of rapes supposedly committed in India every day. Every 20 minutes, the screen blanks out to the numeral “20”. While you were watching, another rape was committed, Assi reminds you in sledgehammer fashion.
Harrowing, hard-hitting and high-minded – Assi proudly wears the triple-H crown of the conscience-pricking Bollywood social drama. Sinha’s latest act of provocation+prescription after films on Islamophobia, caste discrimination and domestic violence does have more layers than is suggested in the unsettling opening minutes.
Alongside launching into the courtroom battle that...