Insaaf Ka Tarazu
Director: B.R. Chopra
Year: 1980
Duration: 146 minutes
Music: Ravindra Jain
Rating: 7.0
When this film came out in 1980 it was
a shocking film. Sort of the Straw Dogs of India. It portrayed a brutal and
for Bollywood graphic rape and what came after. It was especially disturbing
in that the victim was one of Bollywood's biggest stars and taking on this
role was quite controversial. Not that Zeenan Aman ever dodged controversy
- in one of her earliest roles she played a pot smoking runaway in Hare Rama
Hare Khrisna in 1971. Since then she had become a huge star straddling roles
in which she was the heroine but also had the touch of the vamp about her.
She was sexy and she showed it and if she had to pick up a gun and shoot
someone she would. She and Amitabh co-starred in a bunch of excellent films.
Not to be unfair but India has become known
as Rapist Central. The true stories that come out of that country are horrifying
- gang rapes seem to be common - and in the rare times men are charged they
usually go free. As the male defense lawyer in this film says after denigrating
her profession as a model as an open invitation to rape - a true Indian woman
would never go public like this and shame her family, herself, the men. Another
well-known Indian film was made in 1994 in which a woman is gang raped called
Bandit Queen and she is so shamed that she becomes a dacoit (outlaw) and
kills them all. It was a Parallel film. Forty years after this film rape
is still a serious issue in India but now it is getting more publicity. This
film though simplistic and melodramatic in that Bollywood way is powerful
in condemning it and all the social taboos around it.
Bharti (Zeenat) is a popular model and
lives with her younger sister (Padmini Kolhapure, who was fifteen at the
time and went on to a fine career) and has a boyfriend (Deepak Parashar)
who adores her. She also has a wealthy admirer (Raj Babbar) who wants her
and when he can't get it he rapes her. She reports it, they go to trial even
though her female attorney (Simi Garewal) tells her as an attorney I have
to advise you that it will be like being raped a second time and there will
be no justice but as a woman go for it girl. The trial is pure histrionics
from everyone - great dialogue, speeches from one and all and you can guess
the outcome. But that isn't the end of this tale. Good acting all around
from the three actresses but also from the swine but effective defense lawyer
(Shreeram Lagoo) and the judge (the wonderful Iftekhar who with his 300 plus
credits seems to show up in every pre-1980 film I see).
There were only a few songs - apparently
a rape film doesn't seem appropriate to music - and fortunately none during
the trial either - though it might have been fun if they had sung their speeches
instead. But his was a serious film - not even any comic relief - about a
deadly serious subject. Needless to say, the ending is Bollywood in all its
corny glory. Directed by one of the big guns in Bollywood - B.R. Chopra who
had his own production company and brought on his younger brother, Yash Chopra,
who went on to be another even bigger gun.
I recall walking out of the theater during
the rape in Straw Dogs - it made me ill - and I put this one off for years.
I am not sure I am glad I finally saw it, but I saw it.
