Wonder Women is not a film to be dismissed as inconsequential
Wonder Women is not a film to be dismissed as inconsequential
It is easy to be dismissive about something as liberated of erratic energy as Wonder Women in Telugu, Ronnie Screwvala and Ashi Dua’s delicately drawn portrait of five pregnant preparing for the Big Day at a pre-natal school, now streaming on SonyLIV.
Post-pregnancy problems are normally dealt with at home. Mummy or mummy-in-law knows best. It’s a welcome change to see these women from different parts of India and from varying degrees of economical privilege, trooping into this dream space for pregnant women.And yes, their partners too are invited to attend.
Wonder Women is not a film of undulating highs and lows. In fact, the screechy climax where one of the pregnant protagonists goes into labour is so patronizing it almost seems like a mockery of what is expected in a normal commercial film.
What I really like about Wonder Women are the women. Through tritely trope-like in their projection of variety(one sullen, another sunny, one vernacular another angrezi-speaking, one with a missing partner another with an over-protective partner, and so on) the pregnant protagonists are beautifully sketched. I wish there was more about their background.
At one hour and twenty minutes the narration is unable to tell us enough about the protagonist. And yet these five pregnant women are so effectively played that they leave us craving to know about their inner thoughts and invisible worlds. Nithya Menen, Parvathy Thiruvothu, Padmapriya Janakiraman, Sayanora Philip, Archana Padmini and Amruta Subhash are all supremely in control of their character’s destinies. Even during those rare moments of outbursts generated by fear and uncertainty of a mother-to-be, these women bond in a sisterly circle, alas too slight, and yet strong and indelible.
There is an early bout of linguistic conflict when the wonderful Amruta Subhash objects to the other women speaking in English.
“Isn’t Hindi the national language?” she asks hesitantly.
It is. And those who think otherwise are probably living in an alternate reality. Wonder Women shows how deep affinities are formed beyond the barriers of language. Every woman at the pregnancy summit speaks in her own language, and it is not the spoken language that brings them together tying their destinies with one umbilical cord.
It would be unjust to single out any one actress. But yes, Padmapriya Janakiraman has the best moment in the narrative when her mother-in-law, in order to get her son more interested in his wife’s pregnancy asks the father-to-be, “I wonder who the real father of this child is, me or you.”
This wink-wink moment between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law is priceless. I wanted to see many such intimate interludes of female bonding. They are there. But not in large enough numbers.
Writer-director Anjali Menon has taken the dietary course of storytelling. Watching Wonder Women is like having over guests with a self-imposed food embargo at a table laden with delicacies.
Where Wonder Women should have been a feast, it is merely a nibble. No doubt a savoury nibble. But it leaves you craving for more.
Subhash K Jha is a Patna-based film critic who has been writing about Bollywood for long enough to know the industry inside out. He tweets at @SubhashK_Jha.
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