Raada: The Banality of Big and Small Wounds

Varun Chounal and Anuj Jamadagni directed Raada takes its audiences on a ride through the last day of a boy in his hometown. On this side, he is plagued by small town politics and the pitfalls of loyalty; on the other, college beckons. As the narrative (motor)cycles through greed, unchecked violence, and misplaced affections, three young men find their lives and faith come apart with the simple abruptness of a bullet leaving its barrel.

An entertaining 80s aesthetic, stylised violence and a vintage colour palette greet the audience as Raada opens on the last leg of a political campaign in rural Maharashtra. Raju (Sagar Khurd), a political worker of modest standing and extravagant pride, enjoys his tea and smoke while his friend/minion Gotya (Madan Deodhar) does the grunt work. At every level on a hierarchy, there is a rung beneath.

Gotya too, has his own. He will not allow Vikas (Ritesh Tiwari) to pack or spend his last day with his family. Instead, the engineering aspirant (the marker of middle and lower middle class hope for upwards mobility) is forced to tag along on Raju and Gotya’s misdeeds and misadventures. Thus Id, Ego and Superego go to town under the pretext of campaign work. When Raju’s claim over a girl (who is unaware of his existence) is challenged, it leads to a protracted struggle for power, tainted by disgrace, humiliation, and the kind of catastrophe that is both staggering and casual: Raju meets his own boss, Chandu Bhau (Pratap Sonale), the leader of the party, up for election in the next few weeks.

The film can be situated among a spate of Indian works of the last decade that have used small towns as the landscape upon which to enact the quotidian violence of quotidian life. Elections are a favourite. Mercurial, violent men are darlings. And the intense, often vengeful relationships that exist between the powerful and the powerless are their jewel. Aesthetically rendered violence brings an element of pleasure to what is otherwise fraught. It also separates trivial, rather comedic violence from tragic violence, the latter saved for the climax. The story is then familiar but enjoyable nonetheless, even touching in parts (credit to Gotya’s characterization and Deodhar’s performance).

That the mad dog assumes command while kings—plural—fall from grace is clinched in its drama and banality by a little insert at the end. The motorised cycle runs on and on, fed on the steroids of (local) glory and heady loyalties.

Watch Raada (Muck) Short Film Trailer