Provoked

It’s the way she says ‘Punjabi’, making you think it is spelled as ‘Pnjabbi’, which alerts you to the fact that Aishwarya Rai is trying very hard for authenticity.

It’s the way she says ‘Punjabi’, making you think it is spelled as ‘Pnjabbi’, which alerts you to the fact that Aishwarya Rai is trying very hard for authenticity. As Kiranjit Ahluwalia, she is all printed salwaar kameez, lace-edge dupattas, and blood red lipstick. The look is just right. So is the feel, for the most part: she brings to life a woman so provoked after ten years of continuous abuse and assault that she is propelled towards an unimaginable act.

Provoked is based on a true story which created ripples not just in Southhall, but back in Punjab where virginal, not-too-educated brides are still routinely shipped off to strangers (Kiranjit’s husband is the friend of a sister-in-law’s relative) who earn in pounds. The changa munda (Naveen Andrews) turns out to be a monster, who beats and humiliates and rapes his wife, without caring a fig about what his mother and two kids think of him.

The trouble with Jag Mundhra’s film is a factor which plagues all his movies: at some point they stop being films, and turn into theatre. Aishwarya’s stay in prison where she meets her bleeding hearts cellmate

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(Miranda Richardson), who conveniently happens to have a top barrister/solicitor for a brother (Robbie Coltrane), is pure nautanki. All those yard scenes where Ms-I’m-not-scared-of-anyone-Miranda stands up for the timid Asian woman, in the face of the mandatory obese white woman with bad teeth, and the shiny-skinned sympathetic black woman with sad eyes, are cringe-making. So are the scenes when a madeover Kiran (well-cut pants, and jacket, and swish hair-cut) goes to her hearing: the inmates, soul sistahs all, cheer her on, like they were at a football match.

And the trouble with having Aishwarya in the lead is also evident soon enough: she is the only well-rounded character, everyone else is kept sketchily supportive, including Nandita Das’s spirited Southall social worker, who is instrumental in getting Kiran’s case (she is convicted of first degree murder) re-opened. It would have been nice to see a little more of Naveen Andrews—why does a man who starts off being so loving to his beautiful wife go down that pat—but he remains a cipher, too.

Provoked is meant, clearly, to tell us that despite her rep, Aish can do it. And she pulls it off, almost. In parts she is back to being Aish: she can’t help it, especially when she appears in those western outfits, and cleaned-up English diction. But most of the time, she is Kiranjit. And for her, like the woman whose life the movie is based on, it is a victory.