She
Creator: Imtiaz Ali
Stars: Aditi Sudhir Pohankar, Vijay Varma, Vishwas Kini
The title She sounds simple. Yet it’s quite profound and does complete justice to the ideology of the writer-directors, who are trying to deal with the inner turmoil of a woman in a very straightforward and raw manner.
She is indeed a good story revolving around a woman who is struggling to deal with her lost and blurred identity. The series that premiered on 20th March on Netflix is set in Mumbai and is penned by seasoned filmmaker Imtiaz Ali along with Divya Johri, an alumna of St. Stephen’s college.
When a film is co-written, it becomes difficult to make out which part is written by whom. In case of SHE, my assumption is the scenes of the underworld mafia exploration looks like Imtiaz’s style while Bhoomi’s solo scenes might have been the brainchild of Divya.
Gripping story, complex character
The story of She from the very first episode gripped me so tightly that I burnt enough midnight oil to watch it all in one go without even a single break. That’s the beauty of any excellent web series. You lose count of the hours you have spent watching it instead of looking at your table clock again and again.
Although you are in complete grip of the drama unfolding in and around the police headquarters where Bhoomi works as an undercover agent, the story moves at a snail’s pace at home front. Bhoomi’s struggles to get the divorce is the only visible matter. Otherwise one gets to see every day struggles without much ado. It’s like a linear story of her home running alongside a super twisted story on the other, which is actually a good idea from the director’s perspective so that the audience can actually focus on one climax and not two climaxes happening simultaneously. Perhaps the protagonist’s domestic life is shown to give a better glimpse of her insecurities with her sister and her fears as a wife—which is in complete contrast with the seductress she becomes later on when she unravels her own layers and discovers her sexuality.
Who is SHE?
Have you ever tried to imagine the psyche of a girl who has never ever been approached or appreciated by a boy, whose husband wants to divorce her on the grounds of her being cold in sex? It reminded me of the story Thanda Gosht by Saadat Hasan Manto, where a man attempts to rape a dead woman.
“Ho raha hai kuchh? Touch kar.” Bhoomi makes the waiter at the restaurant touch her breasts and suggests him to feel her body. A woman who was until now unsure about her own sexual powers or seductiveness goes on to test them with strangers. This was something quite unique to the character which has never been portrayed by any director. Bhoomi’s subtle dialogue to the teenager boy at the hotel reception “Tu dekha kar merko” is a killer one.
Dealing with sexual and physical insecurities is one of the highlights of the series. Transparent portrayal of a not so good-looking woman’s mental state is depicted through a series of powerful scenes. How an ugly or a not-so-good-looking woman is accepted or seen by her male counterparts is something which we have hardly seen on TV or film screens. Most of the women in lead roles are good looking. Hardly scripts are written portraying the lives and dilemmas of ordinary-looking women. Deepika Padukone portraying an acid attack victim also raises questions on the casting process. Why did the director not cast Bhoomi Pednekar or even a character actress for that role and opted for DP?
With this series, can we perhaps expect the conventional definition of a good looking heroine to break, the way it happened in times of Smita Patil, Shabana Azmi, and Nandita Das? Looks like we are heading in the right direction.
Realistic transformation
The evolution of Bhoomi is not complete in a second. She gets irritated by Saya the first time she meets him and also the next time she meets him during interrogation, her confidence level goes down. She doesn’t behaviorally know how to tackle him; the progression doesn’t happen fast. And that’s the director’s choice and discretion to show people that it is not really easy to overcome your fears and insecurities in real life so fast. This was really unlike in many other films, where a complete positive and powerful behavior change is shown in seconds.
The theatrical Old Man
Personally, the best and the worst take away from the web series She is that mad old man, who lives on the road side, sits on a sofa with élan and talks loudly to himself. Initially the audiences are taken aback by his flamboyant and natural character.
By saying natural, I mean this is one such character, who everybody must have seen on the roads.
Whosoever has cast and directed that man, will have to be given 10 out of 10. I watched that part first in English and was completely blown away by that. Later on while watching that in Hindi it was not that impressive enough though. It reminded me of the days I used to watch three plays a day in theatre festivals of Delhi and used to find one such powerful theatrical characters in those plays on stage.
The scene of Bhoomi talking to the old mad man and revealing her identity as an undercover cop baffled me as an audience as it got me into overthinking mode: Oh, is anybody around there on the road listening to her? Will she be caught? Will the old man tell her truth aloud the way he talks so loudly every night? So, the scene of how could Bhoomi get rid of her tension other than talking to the old mad man is something which needed more attention and brainstorming. He should have been that invisible fly on the wall kind of a character, with whom nobody really ever speaks to on the road in real life. So, that way, the mad man’s character was slightly over used by involving him into the scene. Thank God, they didn’t make an Ila Arun kind of pagal out of him.
Mad man’s dialogue: “time kidhar gaya, pakad kar lao use, hum use nafarmani ki saza denge” is interesting, but has no analogical connection with the story.
You may watch the scenes of the old man in any other language and you’ll still feel the power of it but the dialogues are not in sync with the narrative.
Breathtaking moments: Only one at the start
Breathtaking moments are somehow missing in the series. As an audience I wanted to feel scared every time Bhoomi stood on the road in midnight hours posing as a prostitute.
The series started with a breathtaking scene in the very first episode when Sasya was caught through the trap where Bhoomi was used as a bait. Never after that. The conversation between Naik, the don and Jaya Shinde is quite natural. Naik’s gaze towards Jaya Shinde is quite intimidating. The look and image of Naik as a don is quite realistic and contrary to any stereotypical lusty and lecherous potbellied politician in safari suit. Naik is dressed in plain clothes and seen as a normal man who has a next-door image, was quite impressive. So here again compliments to the casting team. Naik’s interrogation with Bhoomi was also subtle and slow and not like a rapid fire, which makes the audiences eager to know whether she will be able to give the right answers or will fumble somewhere.
Sequences that deserve a mention
The restaurant conversation between the three ladies of the house–Bhoomi, her sister and her mother is pretty progressive. How many mothers and sisters are comfortable discussing their sex lives so openly with each other?
Lokhande, the ex-husband of Bhoomi has not been presented in negative light and as a villain. He is clearly a sex-starved frustrated man. His dialogues clearly present his side of the story what goes on in a failed marriage. And this way the director doesn’t try to make the protagonist
Bhoomi draw unnecessary sympathy from the audiences, which usually happens in case of the failed marriages.
Why does Bhoomi go and get her sister’s mobile phone from her boyfriend? Initially the scene looked like as if she is again checking her sexual powers by seducing her sister’s boyfriend but she ends up only reaching the hotel room just to collect the mobile phone.
Casting delights
The web series SHE has been cast by old associate of Ali and alumnus of Sri Ram Centre for Performing Arts Mukesh Chhabra.
Aaditi Pohankar as the protagonist Bhoomika Pardeshi is at her best for showing the variety of her character in subtle tones and not going completely over the board to show the versatility of the actress inside her. Vijay Varma as Sasya comes across as completely intimidating. His dialogues are penned with such a surprising beauty. Have you ever seen a mafia associate openly sharing all the details about the don? Yes, it happens with Sasya. You want to trust him and then not, and then again and then not. Shivani Rangole as Rupa, Bhoomi’s young, beautiful and seductive sister is quite a replica of flamboyant, full of life, beautiful and selfie-clicking girls of this era.
“Jab maine tumhe bandobast pe dekha tha na” is the same dialogue of motivation, which was repeated again and again by the top cop to motivate the leading lady. In this no anger or leveling of the cop character was visible. The man looks more like a school teacher than a top cop. It looked like the team wanted to cast Ranvir Shorey but could not get him out of his bed.
Male vs. Female cast
While in Paatal Lok, a lot of critics are crying foul that there are hardly any women in the lead except Gul Panag representing the lower middle class, where as in the web series She, there are enough women who are leading the show. So, what the script demands, justice in terms of casting is done accordingly. A script writer must not always be looking for male-female gender ratio while penning the script. After all a film is not a parliament, where 33% women representation is a must.
End of the Season
Overall the entire cop department sounded as if their main objective was to save Bhoomi from getting raped at Naik’s den than actually catching him and stopping his Mafia operations. The 7th and the last episode ends at a note which sounded like “please come and watch our next season”, which I surely will.
Kamal Pruthi aka Kabuliwala is a character actor with 21 years of stage experience. With more than 300 stage shows to his credit, he is an aspiring Bollywood actor. A multi linguist, Kamal has so far acted in 9 languages and directed 6 plays as a Theatre director. Apart from acting in short and corporate films, Kamal is writing web series these days. Kamal can be contacted on 91-8861907362.
I liked that the review is structured and provides comprehensive view within each category. This made it easier to follow through. It definitely helped to decided if I would watch the series, which is most often a reason I read through reviews in general.