Gulf News tabloid reviews the crime procedural Guilty sees college student Tanu (Akansha Ranjan) accuse a popular college heart-throb VJ/Vijay Pratap Singh (Gurfateh Singh Pirzada). His rocker girlfriend Nanki Dutta (Kiara Advani) doesn’t believe the allegations and backs her boyfriend’s claims of innocence. It goes against the grain, but Advani is confident that the film will trigger the much-need conversation about what constitutes consent.
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00:00In the post-MeToo era, it's great that Kiara Adwani has come with a movie
00:04that talks about consent and what constitutes sexual assault and our propensity to victim blame.
00:15We are talking about her new film on Netflix called Guilty.
00:19It's 119 minutes long, it's very short and succinct and compared to Bollywood movie standards
00:25and is directed by Ruchi Naren. It's set in a swanky college in Delhi and it's about how the
00:31college heartthrob Vijay is accused of rape by a woman who's lesser privileged and perhaps not as
00:39erudite and as cerebral as her other classmates. It's a portrait where the girlfriend of the
00:45accused supports him wholly and the entire movie plays out from her perspective. So there is Kiara
00:52who plays Nanki Datta. It's not often that you see in a Bollywood film where the actress is
00:57clearly troubled, the heroine is troubled and the movie is set from her gaze. There are several
01:03things that are very interesting about this film. What I loved about this film is also the novel
01:08concept of what constitutes consent. Very often in Bollywood films, stalking is looked at as
01:15romantic. A no means a yes when a lover is stalking like perhaps his interest, rumoured
01:21love interest. So there are very problematic narratives in Bollywood. So to see a movie
01:27by Ruchi Naren, you know tackling this very, very murky subject of consent is quite interesting,
01:33especially in the Me Too era. Just when we are rejoicing the Harvey Weinstein verdict,
01:38it's important that Hindi films are also giving their perspective on sexual assault and victim
01:45blaming. Regarding the performances, I thought Kiara Adwani did a fantastic job. She plays a
01:50wild child of sorts. She's the kind who can quote Virginia Woolf or Kafka. It is a bit pretentious,
01:57but then in a Delhi University campus, it's often seen that the kids are very cerebral. They know,
02:02they read quite a bit and they inhabit a different space. They're quite intellectual as well.
02:07Perhaps pseudo-intellectual. In fact, the pseudo-intellectualism comes to the fore
02:12when a woman accuses the most popular boy from the college who looks very suave of sexual assault.
02:20Nobody believes her. And that kind of narrative where we're so quick to blame the victim
02:24and slut shame her is effectively showed in this movie. Another thing that I liked are the
02:29performances. Kiara Adwani is perfectly cast. She'll remind you of this girl interrupted.
02:34She has this gone girl vibe about her. We're always second guessing her moves and she's also
02:39got this history of mental illness. So the kind of like, you know, we always doubt her narration.
02:44We also doubt whether she's in the right or wrong. It's almost like Kiara was telling me
02:49yesterday that it's a why done it and not a who done it as such. So why did he do it or if he did
02:56it, you know, is there any way the conflict in her mind, whether her boyfriend could have actually
03:01committed such a horrid crime is beautifully showcased. In fact, it's a very bleak subject,
03:06but the movie moves at a good pace. The one thing that did not work for the movie is a bit of it
03:12enters the pretentious territory. There are many places where there's a legal counsel that's hired
03:17by the boyfriend, Vijay Pratap's family. He has a lot of clout. How his family tries to buy off
03:23the rape survivor, it gets a bit too convoluted rather than keeping it strict. As he said, she
03:28said who's right, who's wrong story. It goes into that murky territory of what power can do to you.
03:34It's also very, very pessimistic. The way it kind of is underwhelming to watch it unfurl on the
03:39screen. Another thing that I thought did not work for the movie is the hurried ending. The climax,
03:45you know, the climax was so disappointing. And there was so much crammed into that those last
03:5010 minutes that it kind of defeated the entire purpose of the film. The movie was going really
03:54good for the first, you know, 100 minutes. In the last few minutes, it descends into this
04:00overdramatic territory. And Kiara Advani is given a monologue and a lot is explained about her past.
04:07It kind of makes the subject, the principal subject of rape, it kind of dilutes what we saw
04:13so far. So that I thought was a bit disappointing. But however, it is great to see actors taking on
04:20such interesting subjects. It may not come together as a whole. But it's good to see actors
04:26like Kiara Advani, whom we saw her in Kabir Singh. I've gone with three out of five. For
04:31my full review, go to gulfnews.com. We have also put out a cover story on Kiara Advani tomorrow,
04:37do pick up tabloid.