Raangi Movie Review: Problems galore in this tepid Trisha thriller

At one point in Raangi, Trisha’s Thaiyal Nayagi (TN) faces a major conundrum. Compromising videos of her niece Sushmitha (played by Anaswara Rajan) are being circulated, and TN has to find a way to solve the issue without the girl’s name being tarnished. This is a very crucial moment in the film for two reasons — 1) This is the scene that serves as the plot pusher, and 2) Everything goes downhill from here. The way TN goes around making things better for her niece is peppered with scenes that are not just poorly conceptualised, but downright regressive. Take, for instance, the scene where she double-checks if the girl in the video is indeed Sushmitha. Considering she plays a journalist who understands the importance of saying the right things and having high ethical standards, the first thing TN tells her niece is to strip bare. Why? Even before we wrap our heads around this bizarrely framed request, which doesn’t even take Sushmitha’s feelings into consideration, the makers decide to train their cameras on the garments that are being removed. We reach our second ‘why’ and within the span of a few more minutes, TN just moves on to her next plan without providing Sushmitha with a well-deserved explanation. As I said, every single thing goes downhill from here.

Cast: Trisha, Anaswara Rajan, Lizzie Antony

Director: M Saravanan

In fact, before moving on to provide a superficial commentary on global issues of warmongering, and oil politics, TN drops in liberal doses of misogyny when she advises a high school girl that beauty is just a teeth braces and plastic surgery away. One can argue that it is what the young girl might have wanted to hear, but then, is it the right message to give in a film that wants its protagonist to be a role model for young and impressionable girls? It is deeply disappointing that this insensitive scene was just preceded by TN’s compelling and holistic view of high school students’ insecurities and proclivity for attention. This constant oscillation between insensitivity and wokeness simply magnifies the problematic parts of the narrative.

There is a never-ending barrage of randomness in Raangi. What starts off as a cyber crime case in Guindy, reaches strife-torn areas of an unnamed (read, muted by the censors) country in Africa. The problem isn’t the shifting of locales but the shifting of ideologies. Why is the person who waxed eloquently about the depravity of catfishing, not take a backseat when they gradually become the person they warned others not to be? What exactly was the equation between TN and Aalim, one of the militants in that African country who strongly lives by the adage, ‘one man’s terrorism is another man’s revolution.’ Even without getting into the politics of this film, it is almost impossible to shake off the feeling of Raangi feeling like the movie equivalent of Murphy’s Law.  

While sketching the character of TN, it is clear that AR Murugadoss and director M Saravanan mistook boorishness for bravado. Despite starting strongly by invoking the names of Gauri Lankesh, and talking about real problems of the society without mincing words, TN fizzles out soon enough. Digs at the present state of journalism would have hit harder if the route taken by TN was anything even remotely aspirational. Yes, TN gets an interesting scene where the character allows the actor to take centrestage, and a sunglass-sporting Trisha gets a solid slo-mo walk, a couple of okay-ish punch dialogues, and an impressive resolution to a potential stunt sequence. But, very little comes off it.

One of the saving graces of the film is the presence of Aalim, and his beautiful love story. Also, the music of C Sathya and the cinematography of KA Sakthivel beautifully capture this brief respite from his overwhelming loneliness. Actually, I’d have loved to see more of Aalim’s understanding of companionship and family in Raangi.

With the last act, Raangi aims to be a slick action thriller, and it indeed looks the part. The stunt sequences, despite the disappointing shooting abilities of the gun-toting men, keep up the engagement factor. But again, there is a pervading sense of uneasiness considering the unexplained equations shared by TN, Sushmitha, and Aalim. However, the biggest problem of them all is the complete disdain for Sushmitha's choices considering she is the centre of every single plot point in Raangi. She is asked to strip down by her aunt without being given any reason. She is asked to pose for a photo not knowing it's being used for catfishing a potential danger to her life. She is asked to go to a foreign country where civil unrest is afoot. She is asked to escape bullets being shot at her without even knowing who has the finger on the trigger. And when Sushmitha asks TN, “Why are they shooting?” the former is at the receiving end of an inappropriately timed sermon on gun control and the futilities of war. 

Come on, team Raangi...this, among a lot of other things, is just… wrong.