Ariyavan review: A male revenge fantasy on sexual violence with hollow sentiments

Ariyavan lectures, shames, and goads survivors of gendered violence, only to offer bloody revenge wrapped in religious fanfare.
Ariyavan review: A male revenge fantasy on sexual violence with hollow sentiments
Ariyavan review: A male revenge fantasy on sexual violence with hollow sentiments

Ariyavan. Here is yet another Kollywood male revenge-fantasy centering on sexual violence against women. But even this prior knowledge doesn’t prepare you for the triggering, infuriating experience of watching the film. Debutant Ishaaon plays Jeeva – just your average, kabaddi-playing, bad-guy bashing, cringefully romancing Tamil cinema hero, until a sickening plot twist strikes. His girlfriend Nethra’s (Pranali Ghoghare) best friend, Jessi (Nishma Chengappa) is being blackmailed into sex work. The blackmailer is a man Jessi loves and has had consensual sex with in the past. But he films her secretly, in order to coerce her later. What’s worse, this man, Appu, is part of a racket led by his brother, Durairaj (Daniel Balaji). Durairaj has made it a business, in his own words, of using his men to cultivate relationships with young women so they can eventually be forced into sex work. 

Jeeva takes it upon himself to save Jessi and the other women being exploited by Durairaj. Intercut a few mind-numbing songs in exotic locations. The body counts rise. Sexual assault and gendered violence is displayed graphically against the backdrop of the agonised screams of women characters. Revenge is finally taken, as bloodily as conceivable. Yet another Kollywood director is satisfied that he has delivered a ‘message padam’ about a social justice issue. 

Helming this misguided endeavour is Ishaaon, who attempts a simmering swagger and righteous rage. He comes off sounding more like that annoying relative who will lecture you at any whiff of an opportunity. Pranali is part Kollywood “loosu-ponnu”, part lost damsel looking to the hero for every decision she has to make. Her emotional reactions to every incident is stunningly unconvincing. Nisham as Jessi manages to be believable, and with a better script may have even given us a more memorable character. Daniel Balaji is, well… Daniel Balaji. His villains are becoming hard to tell apart. He exudes a certain kind of aloof machismo now in most of his roles, a lock of hair falling onto his face as he says and does horrible things. It’s hard to remember the actor as he was long ago, in Vada Chennai for example. 

The songs, completely dissociated with the events of the story, more often than not, are best left uncommented on. 

There is some controversy regarding who the director of this dismal film is. The studio and the opening credits claim it is Mithran R Jawahar of Thiruchitrambalam-fame. Mithrin has, however, reportedly denied any association with the film. The studio has, also reportedly, countered these claims. It’s all very confusing. Regardless of who the director is, making women sit through the graphic enactment of sexual and gender-based violence is a terrible idea. 

Ariyavan is exhausting, enraging, and ultimately pointless. We are given a male hero. He automatically, in Kollywood style, becomes ‘anna’ (elder brother) to the survivors. Until he gives them a rousing speech, shaming the women as “cowards”, they have little agency. This saviour-anna then drives them towards vengeance, which is accomplished as ‘Aigiri Nandini’ — a Hindu hymn on Durga’s slaying of Mahishasura — blasts across the theatre. How many of these women make it to the end of the movie, or how many are abused again for the sake of a plot twist matters little to the director. I can only construe that the sexual violence in the film was just a topic to sell tickets, while women’s bodies are violated and murdered for entertainment. There appears to be little genuine concern about the issue. 

So I want to ask the makers of Ariyavan some questions. Do you really think some insipid hero can be the reason survivors come forward to demand justice in real life? Do you think it helps any of us to sit through dramatisations of the kind of violence we live in dread of? Give us films on structural failures. Give us films on the failure of men. Stop presuming it is enough to lecture, shame, and goad us, only to offer bloody revenge wrapped in religious fanfare. What are the filmmakers trying to say? That women need to be vengeful goddesses before we are allowed to be human? Why does revenge have to happen to chants of a Hindu hymn? So the rest of us, who aren’t Hindu, don’t deserve justice? What does religion have to do with justice?

If male filmmakers want to write screenplays on sexual violence, then make movies that speak to other men. Don’t taunt us and lecture us. Don’t tell survivors what they “need” to do. Tell men how to behave, instead. Shame the men who make a survivor’s too-often lonely fight for justice even more gruelling. The men who say “she is just doing it for attention”, “what about the man’s career?”, “why are you talking about it after so long?” or the sundry other hot takes that are on offer every time a woman speaks up. If you think that won’t work box-office magic, then at least resist the urge to make movies like Ariyavan. Regular ‘masala’ movies seem to be doing quite well by the looks of it? 

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