Swag

female feoticide, miscarriage, gender dysphoria, gender discrimination

• Cast: Sree Vishnu, Ritu Varma…
• Director, Writer: Hasith Goli
• Music Director: Vivek Sagar

Retired policeman Bhavabhuthi goes to claim an inheritance after finding out through a letter that the last heir of the Swaganika family looks like him. He finds himself at odds with Anubhuthi who also claims to be a Swaganika descendant.

The plot was interesting, poorly delivered.

• Direction: The first half of the movie went at an unnecessarily fast pace. They used fast-paced narration that the audience could barely catch up to. The movie was set out to be an approachable comedy but this was not achieved. With this movie trying to be character-driven, it was disappointing to see the scenes and screentime disproportionately focusing on masculine characters.
• Acting: Sree Vishnu brought his dedication to this movie as well. It seemed like the direction let down the actors. Actors who had given stellar performances before weren’t up to their own standards. Sree Vishnu’s performances as Singa, Yeyathi and Vibhuthi were all done well. His portrayal of Bhavabhuthi appeared strained – this may have been because of the facial makeup, which is unfortunate. Ritu’s character was flat and this was definitely not her best performance. Meera Jasmine shines in her scenes.
• Editing: This department may have helped the movie largely by trimming a lot of the fluff. The first half of the movie needed less overproduced scenes which confused the audience. Inconsistent pacing muddled the story and the depth of scenes.
• Themes: The main theme the movie led up to was gender vs biological sex. There were also prominent mentions of misogyny and gender-based violence.  While this seemed to be a genuine effort to make a comedy movie with a social message, it was clear that there weren’t many women or trans folks behind the scenes to make their stories and messaging actually shine.

• Ritu Varma and Sree Vishnu have given much better performances in other movies. Whether it was the story, the dialogue, the environment or direction – there was something that prevented them from giving their best
• The story in the first half was difficult to follow at times. I believe movies that are difficult to understand should have a strong and steadfast logic behind it that makes watching the movie again more enjoyable. Other than that, when the goal of a movie is comedy or otherwise, there shouldn’t be a lag between the speed of the story and the audience understanding where the story is
  • Take the transition from the repeated mentions of needing to find a woman descendant and Chinnayana finding Anubhuthi through the man who bought her scrap metal – this was a rash transition
  • Multiple scenes with the Singa the Swag come and go in a flurry – he is the character that needed to be cut the most, he definitely didn’t need a song
• I don’t know why there were odd shots of people up close, I’m not sure the tight frames added anything other than jarring transitions
• The interaction between Anubhuthi and Vijjamma (Vadivukkarasi) is funny and well done – this was a well thought-out scene, which makes us wish the rest of the movie was made as thoughtfully
• This plot had excellent storyline reveals – the queer descendant and that Bhavabhuthi was committing feticide, the story was let down by the other creative elements
  • With the motivation being dramatic reveals, the characters of this movie were compromised
• Anubhuthi’s character was a very big opportunity to support the storyline and messaging but the way she was written made no sense
  • She portrayed a stereotypical angry feminist that everyone perceives to be angry for no reason
  • For someone who struggles so much with misogynistic behavior, Anubhuthi has no empathy for her mother and her mother’s struggles – also living in proximity to Vibhuthi’s community (here I am referring to the people that Vibhuthi knows and supports, shown throughout the movie). It’s hard to believe that she fostered so much hate over the years and that all of that hate dissipated with one speech when she had been witnessing Vibhuthi her entire life
  • They reveal that the person in the hospital is not Anubhuthi’s mother. If all of that was a ruse, why does she take her boyfriend to see her? From the dialogue, it seemed like they were there multiple times.
    Was she lying to her boyfriend about who her family is? If so, Anubhuthi hates her mother so much that she fakes her whole backstory but chooses to continue living with Vibhuthi despite holding pride in being “independent”
  • Anubhuthi knowing Vibhuthi’s plan and making sure Chinnayana finds his way to their palaka would have made much more sense
• There are scenes that don’t make sense
  • In a matriarchal society, why does a male pujari have so much weight in the royal family’s decisions? The Swaganika queendom was set out to be a comedically exaggerated flip of a patriarchal kingdom. In a patriarchal kingdom, when scholars and the people of the highest knowledge were men, the final say should have come from a woman pujari. From a queen who shows that much dismissal of men, why did she give up that easily? They even had a woman who didn’t approve of Rukmini Devi (Ritu Varma) who could have played a more active role in the story – Uthpala Devi (Meera Jasmine)
  • Vibhuthi sees Anubhuthi selling the palaka. If she wanted to bring her family together she may have needed it. Why doesn’t she stop Anubhuthi?
  • Vibhuthi’s motivations seem to be to show Anubhuthi her family and to try to gain the respect of her family.
    • Vibhuthi doesn’t know what sort of person Bhavabhuthi is until she seeks him out – for all she knows he could have been the most radically inclusive person, it just so happens that he is extremely sexist. If she is looking for family, why doesn’t she search for her sisters? From what we were shown, wouldn’t Anubhuthi benefit from connecting with people who loved Vibhuthi for who she was as a child?

No. There are better queer and trans stories out there that deserve attention.

• Bhavabhuthi’s voice was extremely irritating – especially as an audience member with misophonia.
• A very big missed opportunity to add a layer to Vibhuthi’s character is her relationship with her daughter, Anubhuthi. Vibhuthi shows a strong desire to be a parent, but the only thing that is shown between Anubhuthi and Vibhuthi is the effect of bullying. While bullying is definitely a thing, trans parents can raise empathetic whole individuals just like cis parents.
• This movie ends with a line scrolling up the screen saying “Linga vivaksha leni samaanathvame nijamaina vaarasathvam” (Equality with no sexual discrimination is true legacy). This is funny because Vibhuthi and Bhavabhuthi have seven sisters who are nowhere to be seen – not even in the closing scenes showing where the characters end up. So I’m not sure what delusional legacy this movie thinks it’s passing on.
• Favorite line: Vibhuthi says, “Nannu kalipithenega prapancham ante”
• The distribution of screentime in this movie is actually quite irritating – for example, why do we need to see Yeyathi and Singa the Swag dancing? Vibhuthi speaks to trans people’s last rites being done after dark, when no one will see them. When Preethi dies, before any sort of sadness sinks in the scene, it cuts away to Bhavabhuthi and Singa’s conversation which also didn’t need to be so long. Singa has too many scenes, but his character feels like an afterthought. Anubhuthi’s character is two-dimensional.
• While I can appreciate an intention, this movie faltered too many times along the way. Intentions without intentional follow-through but with the added layer of pride for making a progressive movie are in the same boat as “thoughts and prayers” Instagram captions to me.

• Movie Rating: 4/10
• Maguva Impact Scale: +0.5