Bandit Queen
Picture: C
Sound: C+ Extras: C- Film: B+
I have to give director Shekhar Kapar credit. Bandit Queen (1994) tells the
true-enough story of Phoolan Davi, who went on a spree of killing, revenge and
robbery after a terrible life of severe oppression and inexcusable sexual abuse
after being man around three times her age.
From being violated in unspeakable ways to be “put in her place” because
she was considered to aggressive for a child, especially a female one, the
constant rape, abuse and servitude continued for years until she was unjustly
banished from where she lived.
As an adult, she (Seema Biswal, in an amazing performance)
looks for a better life, but the same kinds of abuse and hatred continue until
one man falls in love with her. Just
when things look like they might get better, her lover is killed, in part
because she is still known and considered too subversive in a society that uses
sexual abuse, mutilation and torture to keep women down. She decides to fight back and take revenge,
recruiting (in what now may seem ironic after recent events) a Muslim gang to
seek revenge on her native India male oppressors. The film is uncompromising in shows and telling the story. Eventually, the government intervenes and
all hell breaks loose.
Even if Davi embellished her story, supposedly recanting
some or all of it later, there is enough history here to make this interesting
and the film in total is a powerful message more relevant than ever that any
culture or country that allows women to be degraded perpetually as policy is
one that needs to change or be destroyed.
That runs from the Middle East all the way back to the United States,
where new assaults on women’s rights and privacy are under a new series of
assaults like nothing in decades. Bandit
Queen is the kind of history that can and will repeat itself when the
situation gets that ugly.
The full frame 1.33 x 1 image is an old analog NTSC
transfer that has been sadly recycled for this DVD, but deserves a digital High
Definition transfer soon. Ashok Mehta’s
cinematography is very good, deserving much better than this. The Dolby Digital 5.1 remix is not bad in
boosting the original theatrical sound, but the age of the film cannot be hid
by that. Maybe going back to more of
the original sound elements and considering DTS would be a good idea. The only extras are trailers for this and
other Koch feature film DVDs, but this is a must-see film that has appreciated
with age and if you have not seen it, you will not be disappointed. Just know it is graphic and hard hitting,
the kind of film we do not see enough.
- Nicholas Sheffo
