Emergency Movie Review: Episodic Documentary On Indira Gandhi

Kangana Ranaut acts & directs a film based on Former Indian P.M Indira Gandhi's life, Interesting! But is the movie also equally interesting?

Emergency Movie Cast/Actors: Kangana Ranaut as Indira Gandhi, Anupam Kher as Jayaprakash Narayan, Shreyas Talpade as Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Mahima Chaudhry as Pupul Jayakar, Milind Soman as Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw, Satish Kaushik as Jagjivan Ram, Ashok Chhabra as Morarji Desai & others

Emergency Movie Director: Kangana Ranaut

Emergency Movie Production House: Manikarnika Films & Zee Studios

Emergency Movie Release Date: 17th January, 2025

Emergency Movie Available On: Theatrical Release and (likely to be released on Netflix OTT Platform)

Emergency Movie Released/Available In Languages: Hindi

Emergency Movie Runtime: 2h 26m

Emergency Movie Critic Review:

It is a misleading title. When it takes off with little Indira in her grandfather’s house at Anand Bhavan in 1929 where her early dislike for aunt Vijayalakshmi Pandit is established, and it tracks her until the day she was assassinated in 1984, it’s not just about the biggest mistake of her political life. What writer-director Kangana Ranaut has made is a full-fledged, political bio-documentary, detailing the defining moments of Indira Gandhi’s public life, before and after the Emergency that she infamously clamped on the country in 1975.

In seeking to understand the person behind the Emergency, Ranaut and her writers Tanvi Kesari Pasumarthy, Ritesh Shah and Jayant Sinha, bring to the fore the vulnerabilities of the PM with the iron facade.

When grandfather Motilal Nehru taught her that satta was taaqat, the thirst for the top seat took birth early. Indira conveyed it with the facial reaction she had to her father’s meeting where his successor was to be picked.

The research is heavy. Indo-China war of 1962, Indira saving Assam from her father’s political carelessness which created PoK, swiftly shifting frames of Lal Bahadur Shastri taking oath, his funeral, her taking over as PM. Alongside the political turning points in India’s post-Independence history are fleeting glimpses of her tension-fraught marriage to Feroze Gandhi (Adhir Bhatt) and her friendship with confidante Pupul Jayakar (Mahima Chaudhry).  

The history that an older generation has witnessed is out there. The 1971 victory that divided Pakistan into two and the growing belief in the slogan ‘Indira is India, India is Indira’, wallowing in the increasing sycophancy. There is a moment of discomfort when J Krishnamurthy perceptively remarks that a day comes when flattery seems false even to you.

The Simla Pact of 1972 which was later studied as an inexplicable surrender to Bhutto’s Pakistan, marked the beginning of the end. The disenchantment with Indira when Jayaprakash Narayan (Anupam Kher) began his revolution against her until the Allahabad High Court judgement banned her from electoral politics for six years which finally led to the Emergency.

The shutting down of institutions, the media houses that crawled before her, Indira’s imperiousness at its height when she told the President that she was the council of ministers. But Ranaut rightly marks this infamous chapter with the excessive power exercised unfettered by Sanjay Gandhi (Vishak Nair), his mother blind to and helpless too, in the face of his frightening influence over her decisions including the appointment of VC Shukla as I&B Minister. Practically caricaturised as the snarling villain of the era with his impetuous and heartless DDA demolitions and forced sterilisations, even best friend Pupul’s warning to Indira that Sanjay is known as the “bigada hua” son of an indulgent mother, falls on deaf ears.

But can misplaced imperiousness survive in what is essentially a democracy? Paranoia sets in, the massacre of Mujibur Rehman and his family in next door Bangladesh heightening it. The overuse of loud background music and the score ‘Bekariyaan…’ accompanies all of it, especially the scenes of paranoia. The splashes of water needed to awaken Indira come from different quarters. Sanjay the unstoppable disrupting a meeting of the council of ministers leading to a walkout by men like Jagjivan Ram (Satish Kaushik) who finally begin to show some spine, Indira watching on. Sanjay insolently occupying his mother’s chair, a high point of his overvaulting ambitions.

Outside the PM’s residence, ‘Sinhasan khaali karo’ as the chant from JP’s movement lands effectively.

The lifting of the Emergency, Indira’s electoral defeat, her arrest, her return. The creation of a Frankenstein called Bhindranwale. Indira distancing Sanjay from the power centre and his death in a plane that he piloted with characteristic recklessness. The vulnerable surfaces again when celebrations break out on the streets. What’s the occasion, wonders Indira, out for a drive incognito. The rakshash (demon) is dead, cheer citizens. It breaks Indira, the mother. Not Indira, the PM who takes a trademark tough stand against Bhindranwale to quell the Khalistani movement. Operation Blue Star followed by her assassination on October 31, 1984.  

It is a full document of Indira who made her mistakes and paid for them. And you have to give it to Kangana for the guts to take the directorial reins officially in her hands. She also transforms herself, the colour of her hair, the contours of her face, the thin voiced-speeches, so perfect.

Mahima Chaudhary comes a close second in her performance as Pupul Jayakar.

But the long, episodic and mirthless narration can confuse those who don’t know the details of the Indira era. In more proficient hands, perhaps the political life of Indira Gandhi would’ve been far more watchable, the important characters fleshed out better, the narration as gripping as it should have been. Think of Harishchandrachi Factory (2009), the biopic that so delightfully told the story of Dadasaheb Phalke. Or think of the more recent Freedom At Midnight or Rocket Boys which also dealt with a similar political world.

Emergency – Watch Or Not?: If you’re ready for a knowledge document and episodic history lessons that track the life of one of the most important leaders of India, this will be a rewarding outing.

Emergency Review Score Rating: 2.5 out of 5 (i.e. 2.5/5)

Emergency Movie Official Trailer:

Credits: Zee Studios

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