Padmaavat

A six year old trained girl would have more finesse in the archery department that Rani Padmaavati and as for the story it’s a war fought by a madman for a queen whose hype of beauty is only known to the narrator of the film and passed on to the madman by a messenger as an act of treason. No way to validate that, really? In history or otherwise.

The film isn’t a tribute to the Rajputs but to the house of commons it is their false sense of pride in ethics and if not that, stupidity. I mean, a King who goes to an enemy quarter without weapons and gets kidnapped has to be a stupid, right? While the queen who exhibits an intelligent sense of strategy and common sense actually believes that the madman will take one look at her and stop the war? Both these characters conflict themselves except for the madman. 

SLB should focus on the nuances of his characters as much as he does on his sets. I say, stop capitalizing on big names in history and get inspired by the period drama GoT of no time known to humankind and create something as such.

However, this cloud of a film has a beautiful silver lining – his forte in sets, the cast he has chosen who resuscitate the film and keep it alive in spite of the slowly dying story, and a bit of cinematographer’s intelligence. It’s not easy to show war and to use sand and bring out a head as victory is probably the most intellectually lazy thing to do for a director. Ranvir Singh plays the convincing evil but wise madman who understands wars are fought only to be won. His character is flawless, no conflicts, and he probably brings his own sensibilities to the acting. Shahid has poise and pride of a King. Not sure about Rani Padmaavati but if Deepika was the queen of any land as depicted in the film, forget Mewar or Chittaur, masses get why wars will be fought for her.