The film’s success owes less to its promise to titillate than to its narrative that touches a chord since it allegorises the sub-conscious political perceptions of many Indians
The bad press about Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Animal seems to have worked in its favour: the film is actually drawing crowds in some theatres where it’s still playing. It has been termed as ‘misogynistic’ and one marked by ‘toxic masculinity,’ but these were also the terms used to describe his earlier offering, Kabir Singh (2019), a triumph of narration compared to Animal. Most of the charges made against his films — for instance, the surfeit of sex and the mindless violence — are legitimate and difficult to refute. However, it does not mean that we should not make attempts to infer its socio-political implications. We live in a society, and every bit of mass communication, whether intentional or unintentional, carries meaning as it is directed at the public.
Many of the allegorical tropes used in Animal have precedents in popular cinema. However, before examining the film, it is imperative to understand that popular mediums like cinema that reach a wide public need to address the concerns of their constituencies. American Postmodern theorist Fredric Jameson, while arguing about ‘Third World’ texts, controversially said that they should be read as national allegory. His reasoning was that ‘private life’ had not developed in the ‘Third World’ as it had in the developed countries where narratives could be entirely about individual lives — with psychology as the focus. In the developing countries, stories would generally have public connotations and pertain to a community, usually the nation, since most cinemas are repositories of national culture.
The family in Animal: A reflection of contemporary India
Cinema as mass culture, even in the developed world, such as Hollywood, needs to be allegorical to resonate with audiences. Superheroes, for instance, usually sport attires in red and blue colours, mirroring those of the American flag. Art films may avoid such representations since they target niche audiences, but not so the Hollywood blockbusters. As regards mainstream Hindi cinema, it is widely understood that many of the representations seen in it reflect key socio-political developments in the national space. ‘The Angry Young Man’ of the 1970s, for instance, was a product of Indira Gandhi’s radical rhetoric and has been interpreted as the marginalised trying to claw his way into the mainstream of economic life through illegality. The Independence and the subsequent economic liberalisation of 1991 are other historical occurrences that left their mark upon Bollywood’s film narrative, but such representations are a continuing process.
In Animal, the film’s protagonist Ranvijay Singh (Ranbir Kapoor) is the son of Balbir Singh (Anil Kapoor) ‘India’s greatest industrialist’ and the owner of Swastik Steels. Vijay has grown up resenting the fact that his father has not given him enough attention and has become aggressive — even as he adores him and will not bear him being criticized. There is a hint of The Godfather here and Vijay is partly cast in the mould of the ruthless Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) with regard to his family’s enemies. There is an assassination attempt on Balbir Singh and Vijay’s brother-in-law, who is implicated, is killed by Vijay just as Connie’s husband Carlo was liquidated by Michael in Francis Ford Coppola’s classic. But more important from my viewpoint is what Balbir Singh’s family represents. There is no evidence of the state and its laws outside its domain and it is a force by itself. Vijay is unconstrained and, even in school, carries an AK-47, and fires it to protect his sister. The family is sacred even to the adolescent schoolboy.
The way the protagonist’s family is presented is more as contemporary India itself — as we believe it is globally perceived — since the country is not separately shown to make Vijay’s family the subjects of a nation-state. The nation represented as a family gathering had an allegorical precedent in Sooraj Barjatya’s Hum Aapke Hain Koun..! (1994) and, there too, there was no indication of the family being subjects. That film was arguably the first one from Bollywood to register the end of ‘socialism’ and the ushering in of the free market. It dealt with the underprivileged as patronized by the rich, dependent on their generosity and benevolence. The family gatherings included the rich as well as these servants, all hierarchically arranged. They also incorporated a Muslim couple as guests to suggest the inclusive nation (portrayed as ‘Ramrajya’).
Family -as-nation in the global milieu
In the second half of Animal, it is learnt that Balbir Singh’s family has estranged cousins, led by Abrar Haque (Bobby Deol), who want a share of the business/wealth and this seems like an allegory of the Indo-Pak conflict; the cousins are trying to kill Balbir Singh on account of their claim being denied. Partition has been allegorised before as division of family land between bickering brothers (in Manoj Kumar’s Upkar, and Raj Khosla’s Do Raaste). We could hence surmise that the ‘cousins as enemies’ represent India and Pakistan in the global order, the Sikh identity accorded to the protagonists inspired by the recent happenings in Canada. The family may be Sikh but there is a conspicuous Brahminical ritual it participates in, which means the acceptance of overall Hindu religious authority.
Animal may be a mess in terms of its narrative because of the adult material introduced deliberately into it to draw audiences, but the glimmerings of socio-political meaning can still be detected. The first aspect is the implacable aggression exuded by Ranvijay Singh. He is not like Kabir Singh in the earlier film in that he is not a sexist individual transacting in Indian society, but akin to a global force on his own, not even challenged or threatened. His father not having time for the child Vijay (despite loving him) does not lead Vijay to be estranged. He is ‘distant’ from the family only to the extent of being given an international education.
Overall, he is placed in the role of the powerful protector of the family-as-nation in a global milieu since national boundaries are non-existent. Even when seriously injured and getting a heart transplant, his invulnerability is not in doubt. The women in the film are not ‘characters,’ but placed there only to affirm his masculinity. ‘Animal’ may sound like a pejorative term but Vijay is a heroic creation since there is nothing he does except with the noblest of motives, the primary one being the protection of his father and his family. Vanga allegorises the aggressively masculine leadership of the India of today, merciless against its international enemies. The film also does not suggest that there are Indians among the enemies though Vijay’s brother-in-law is a traitor.
Taps into the political views of many Indians
This interpretation of the film makes it seem like a patriotic celebration and the question that naturally follows is why should there be so much vulgarity in it — often laced with humour — if this had been the case. The absence of solemnity in Animal owes to it being from a South Indian director and not from Bollywood. South Indian films also deal with the nation but in a more ambivalent way in that regional loyalties compete with national ones. Many saw RRR as a patriotic exercise, but it was made by a Telugu filmmaker SS Rajamouli, who did not take nationalist motifs as seriously as Bollywood does and, therefore, had patriotic Telugu-speaking Indians demonstrating their nationalist fervour after defeating the British colonialists in dance. This is more flippant than serious and shows the tendency of regional South Indian filmmakers to maintain a certain distance when addressing national issues. Conversely, they tend to adopt a more solemn tone when dealing with regional issues.
Local culture, as exemplified in Ponniyin Selvan, is taken much more earnestly by South Indian cinema. Animal and KGF 2 — both of which showcase ‘pan-Indian motifs’ — suffer from narrative messiness, stemming from a limited engagement with the nation as an allegorical subject. The filmmakers leverage sentiments within the national context, and the inclusion of incongruous asides renders the films into a pastiche (parody without mockery). A patriotic Bollywood film might not taint patriotism with sensationalism, as seen in Animal. In Bollywood, the portrayal of ‘masculinity’ often aligns strongly with military prowess, as seen in films like Uri: The Surgical Strike (2019). However, Animal takes a less puritanical approach, but one should not be misled by the titillation to believe that the film is not tapping into political views held by the public.
Will the audiences see the film consciously in such terms because it does not try to evoke patriotic sentiments? The answer is that public happenings capture our political imagination when we are able to make stories out of them as comforting myths. Political leaders relish the possibility that the public sub-consciously compares them to mythological figures and situates them in relatable stories. Hence, popular cinema, even when dealing with the socio-political world, creates and perpetuates mythologies rather than respect factual details. In a sense, Animal’s success owes less to its promise to titillate than to its narrative that touches a chord since it allegorises the sub-conscious political perceptions of a large number of Indians.
