You might have heard some buzz regarding RRR in certain social media circles, about how both westerners and non-westerners alike have been blown away, or how theaters showing the film are still going gangbusters even though it came out a few months ago.
Since the rest of this review is me gushing about the movie and probably spoiling everything in it, here’s all you need to know: watch this film if you have the opportunity, preferably in Telugu, and preferably on a big movie theater. Out of all the blockbuster movies released in the world this year, this is one of the best of them: a riveting triumph of maximalist storytelling that sticks with you in one form or another long after you’ve left the cinema. It doesn’t quite reach the epic scale of Baahubali, but RRR is a fantastic film on its own, cementing S.S. Rajamouli as one of the best blockbuster filmmakers living today.
The overarching premise of the film is pretty simple: what if two real life historical figures, both revolutionaries who never met, were actually besties and had awesome superhuman abilities? While historical fan fiction can vary from total goof fests like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012) to serious, contemplative fare like Hele sa Hiwagang Hapis (2016), RRR is pure 100% spectacle: part musical, part bromance, part balls-to-the-wall action film, part rousing, chest-thumping anti-colonialist call to revolution. At this point in time, Komaram Bheem (N. T. Rama Rao Jr.) and Alluri Sitaramaraju (Ram Charan, whom Rajamouli worked with in proto-Baahubali fantasy film Magadheera (2009)) are not (yet) the revolutionaries Indians know in history books: the former is a tribal leader tasked with finding a kidnapped girl, while the latter works as a police officer for the British Empire. They develop their friendship not knowing their respective allegiances, as things come to an inevitable conclusion. Spoiler alert but not really: it gets really wild.
As Bheem and Ram, water and fire, reach the ends of their respective story arcs, they learn the value of revolution and reveal their own intentions to fight back against their colonizers: for one, it is a direct, physical kind of empowerment – through arms, knowledge and ideas. For the other, it is the spiritual empowerment that comes from igniting the fervor of all those who desire liberation from oppression.
It’s this visual and lyrical poeticism that struck me more than the over the top (yet infinitely enjoyable) action sequences. Near the end of the film’s second act, Bheem is tied up and tortured. He must kneel to the British Empire and confess his crimes in front of a large crowd. A leaf caresses his cheek and it hits a puddle on the platform he is on. Bheem sees the reflection of his face on the water, which is his visual theme. He then sings a song, a prayer to himself, that declares: if he submits to the oppressor, what worth is he as a leader, as a pillar of his community, as a child of the forest? As he is repeatedly beaten and tortured, he does not lose his composure. Eventually he faints without ever kneeling, an action that deeply moves everyone present: in Ram, it makes him question his motives; in the people watching, it ignites a fury that explodes as they rush the stage. Jr. NTR acts the hell out of that scene, honestly one of the best parts of the entire film. Here it is if you want to be spoiled.
The climax of the film is as ridiculously awesome as I expected; perhaps even more so. People familiar with the palm tree catapult scenes in Baahubali 2 will know the level of action that I’m talking about. But even if, at face value, things look absolutely ridiculous, for many of the people that have seen it (including myself) it’s welcomed rather than treated as silly. Of course they (the protagonists and Rajamouli both) would have the audacity to do what they did in RRR. Over the course of the film, we get to know these two people and we believe they really could have been friends, and that they could be capable of anything. Without resorting to metanarratives or appealing to “fanboy” tastes, RRR is cinematic spectacle at its most enjoyable.
p.s. It’s also interesting to note the level of intertextuality in RRR where the texts it references are different than the usual things that we see in Western Media (Rajamouli himself has admitted incorporating elements from texts like the Ramayana and Mahabharata in his works, and many South Indian revenge films follow the same basic structure).
This review first appeared on Present Confusion
