Assi Review: Taapsee Pannu-Kani Kusruti's Courtroom Drama Is Triggering And Traumatic

Threat and dread hit you hard as soon as Anubhav Sinha's Assi begins. But this unsettling social drama ends on a note that no cynic would see coming.

Parima, played by a tremendous Kani Kusruti, is a Malayali woman who is a teacher at a Delhi school. She has a loving husband called Vinay (a perfect Mohd Zeeshan Ayyub) who happens to be a Haryanvi and a young son Dhruv. The family is shattered in one night: Parima is abducted and gang-raped by five men in a car after exiting the Metro late from a school farewell party.

These men take turns raping and assaulting Parima, nearly blinding her in one eye. What follows is a relentless, brutal sequence, too triggering, too unending. Those minutes drag like hours; the men's cackling 'brotherhood' counting who lasts longest, is unbearable. The director forces you to feel the survivor's trapped trauma. It should have ended sooner.

After raping and assaulting Parima for hours, they dump her by the railway tracks, half naked, at daybreak. A Good Samaritan spots her in the morning and helps her. In a key shot, a couple of women scatter dry red chillies from a thela to carry Parima to the nearest hospital, perhaps Anubhav Sinha and co-writer Gaurav Solanki's hat-tip to Ketan Mehta's Mirch Masala.

Enter Taapsee Pannu's Raavi, a lawyer who represents Parima in court. Raavi believes in the right kind of justice following due process, even though she often feels dejected by the outcome. Raavi knows ghee seedhi ungli se nahin nikalta, so she does exactly what the famous Hindi proverb says.

She is also grieving the loss of a close colleague, Kaveri who died in a hit-and-run accident (Divya Dutta in a voice appearance). Kaveri's husband Kartik, played by Kumud Mishra, is a secretive man who bears the cross of leaving his wife to die while he was "out of the country"?

Before the rape, we are shown that Parima and Vinay are raising a boy in the digital age and they ensure their son Dhruv learns rather than tell other girl children what they need to be wary of. Parima refuses to back down after things go south in the case. She throws away the dupatta covering her face. She feels suffocated with the dupatta concealing her identity. And why shouldn't she? She is not guilty.

Parima gives it back to the defense counsel who tries to undermine her testimony in court. While her case is on, she wants to resume teaching at her school because she wants to get back to the grind, only to be discouraged by a disheartened principal (Seema Pahwa) who says "the entire school had failed" her. The look on Parima's face when she sees women in a baaraat dancing to the lines of Main Toh Tandoori Murgi Hoon from Dabangg 2's song Fevicol Se is heartbreaking.

Her husband Vinay is trying to establish a caring, friends-first relationship with his son, something starkly different from his disciplinarian and khap-ruled father. He fondly calls his son "Yaara", quite like how Shah Rukh Khan's father called him. Their son is never explicitly told that Parima was gangraped but he knows his mother is wounded, inside out. We see him growing up in a matter of a few hours with a hopeful child transforming into a realistic young man.

Mohd Zeeshan Ayyub is heartachingly good as the man who somehow holds himself together as sees his wife struggle with unbearable pain. As Vinay, he's the stand-up guy - he is by Parima's side, no words, no explanation asked, just present. The good old moral support with a spine.

In Assi, there's Manoj Pahwa too. Another one of Anubhav Sinha's trusted collaborators, he plays the father of one of the accused's who helps them sweep the crime under the carpet for as long as possible. Watch out for the scene where he likens a plate of Chhole Bhature eaten outside to the one at home with women. Supriya Pathak Kapur appears in one sequence and nails the brief as a woman in her 50s who has made peace with patriarchy and now wields it like a weapon.

Assi packs a lot in its 2 hour 14 minute-runtime, touching upon several themes of locker room conversation, consent, shame, corruption, vigilante justice, trial on social media, future of children, and accountability of adults. Good intentions but not everything adds up.

For one, a subplot of a murder mystery on the side where a faceless 'hero' rises who goes around town killing Parima's rapists. He is dubbed as 'The Umbrella Man'. No points for guessing who he is but it feels forced. The judge, played by Revathy, tries to be objective but you see that she had decided the verdict long before.

Assi makers say 80 rape cases are reported across India daily. After 20 minutes, the big screen turns red, warning that one rape just occurred. There's no reminder needed, but the red flash on the 70 mm-screen yanks you from the film straight into the horrifying reality it mirrors.

Also Read | Taapsee Pannu Claims OTT Has Turned Its Back On Unconventional Films Like Assi: 'They Pick Movies That Work In Theatres'