Sangam do baar aana chaiye, ek baar akele aur ek baar kisi ke sath.
masaan is neeraj ghaywan’s feature-film debut, and something i’ve been looking forward to watching for a while. and he completely knocks it out of the park. he picks his stories with so much thought. and knows which societal issues to talk about, and he does his work so well.
the film follows two different stories occurring at the same time. the first is devi pathak, played by the immensely talented richa chadda. her character has a sexual encounter that ends in an unfortunate tragedy when the police catch them, and the extremely violent police officer intimidates them to the point that the boy kills himself. throughout the rest of the film, we see richa’s character being belittled by everyone. she is blamed for the boy’s death when, in reality, she didn’t do anything wrong. we see that she always stands up for herself, even in front of her father, constantly stating how she wants to get out of the conservative, small-minded city they live in. she wants to study and have an opportunity at a better life. we follow her journey as she deals with deeply rooted misogynistic consequences in an extremely conservative part of the world, which i thought was very well written and portrayed. it’s a deeply relatable story that i’m sure a lot of women would identify with.
the second storyline is deepak chaudhary’s, which ended up being my favourite part of the film. deepak is played by vicky kaushal, who i’ve already really enjoyed watching on screen. he is, like richa, constantly trying to find ways to get out of what he calls a hellhole. he belongs to a scheduled caste, which from what i’ve gathered from the movie, is associated with cremating bodies at the varanasi ghats. deepak is extremely capable. he’s smart and clearly has the skills to make it out. but then his girlfriend, sudha passes away in an accident, he falls into a serious state of depression and grief, which takes away the motivation he once had. she had been a major factor in pushing him forward. but eventually, he gets his moment when he receives a job offer in civil engineering and leaves varanasi, which made me so happy for him.
there was a slow build-up in me where i kept wondering whether these two characters are ever going to interact or not? and what touched me the most was that they do. the first connection is subtle yet, has a strong effect on us. we realise that devi’s father found the gold ring deepak threw into the water, which helped him pay off the corrupt police officer. deepak made such a huge impact on someone’s life without even realising it. and when the two characters finally meet in the last scene of the film, it made me so emotional. richa has been going through so much, bottling everything up, putting on this front of being a strong woman. and she finally breaks down and cries. deepak, who happens to be sitting behind her, becomes so emotionally invested in this stranger’s pain. he tries to comfort her by offering her water, then steps back, respecting her space, and waits until they get on the boat to finally speak to her. it’s one of the most memorable final shots ever. my heart is so full.
