Movie Review: The rot is deep in Anubhav Sinha's 'Assi'
“FISSALNE KI BHI KOI seema hoti hai (There’s a limit to slipping)”, says a police officer, quoting Ram Manohar Lohia. But in Anubhav Sinha’s Assi, and in India’s public life, there is no limit to slipping. A spy, unable to deal with the guilt of not being able to meet his dying wife, says: “We were so busy painting the boundary wall, we forgot our house was dirty.” The rot is deep in Assi.
Families protect criminal sons; the police look the other way as evidence is destroyed; and our leaders have abandoned us. Painting the aftermath of a rape of a teacher, the movie sets about trying to reconstruct the case and getting justice for Parima (played brilliantly by Kani Kusruti). Taapsee Pannu plays Raavi, her lawyer, while Revathy is unyieldingly impartial as the judge. The limitations of the justice system in the face of 80 rapes a day, the continued vulnerability of empowered women, and the vanishing of poetry from our lives are all intertwined here. Sinha is a filmmaker who makes headlines come alive, and delivers crushing blows. If women wanted they would burn the world down in anger, says Raavi. But they don’t. Like Parima, they are survivors.