Pathaan is a curiously political statement masquerading as a thoughtless, or rather ‘thought-free’, action film. Its initial allure rests largely on its action-packed thrill, and the combined sex appeal of the cast. Moreover, the film rides on the very particular star power of Shah Rukh Khan (SRK), which neither Deepika Padukone nor John Abraham, despite their immense celebrity and impressive careers, can quite equal.
As Mukul Keshavan detailed in his review of Pathaan, Shah Rukh Khan’s magnetic charisma and longstanding reputation as a kind and good citizen has worked in the film’s favour. After a six-year hiatus, during which the rumour that his career had passed its expiry date had proliferated, his return to the screen could not be more triumphant.
Pathaan locates a humdrum action-movie plotline, heavily influenced by the realities of a pandemic-suffering world, within the India-Pakistan political context. Combining scenarios reminiscent of Contagion (2011), Kingsman (2014), and the James Bond movie franchise, and building bridges between movie worlds in the style of the Marvel cinematic universe, Pathaan constructs an archetypal story using larger-than-life stunts, and a plethora of beautiful filming locations, to produce a visually impressive result. However, as it plays out, Pathaan unfolds as more than a ruckus of action-shots and visual bewitchment.
Ironically, as we shall see, Pathaan is an ode to the country (referred to as desh throughout the film, rather than Bharat) – so much so that some cinema halls neglected to play the national anthem prior to its screening. After all, why revel in a minute of jingoism when you are about to screen two and half hours of ‘Jai Hind’? But Pathaan’s patriotism (rather than jingoism) is angled differently. Two points of analysis reveal the socio-political position that Pathaan intends to occupy: its choice of how to distribute nuance, and what within it is perceived as controversial (or what is not).
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The most infamous example of controversy is, of course, Deepika Padukone’s ‘saffron-coloured’ bikini in one of the film’s two songs, suitably titled ‘Besharam Rang’. If the colour of the bikini, post-release, was passed off as an unintentional jibe at the highly sensitive ruling party, determined to read dissension into every detail of products outside its purview and control, the title of the song suggests otherwise. In fact, the entire song is provocative, using sexual innuendo through music and dance to depict a moment of substances and capricious (d)alliances in which both Indian and Pakistani, male and female are freely indulging. And this lustful indulgence is presented in a celebratory tone, and not as a demonstration of outright sin. This musical opposition to the puritanical ‘modesty’ that underlines BJP discourse and ideology, would seem to suggest that the ‘saffron’ bikini was no mistake, and that the song was intended to covet controversy and in so-doing, prevail.
Meanwhile, the India-Pakistan issue, which forms the principal creative fodder for the film’s storyline, is harnessed in such a way as to avoid the typical pitfalls of this age-old animosity that can breed controversy in both countries. Heroes (and I used the term ‘hero’ as inclusive of characters of all genders) and villains are constructed on both sides of the border, and in a manner analogous to the careful presentation of North Korea-South Korea relations in the South Korean TV series Crash Landing On You (2019). Given the precarious political and militaristic situation between the two countries, the series had to toe a careful line in its portrayal of the conflict to avoid a spillover from fictitious to political reality. In a similar vein, the protagonists in Pathaan from India and Pakistan face-off with their respective national antagonists, thus avoiding a classic ‘India versus Pakistan’ scenario. Of course, the principal instigator of the evil plot that precipitates the rest of the storyline, just so happens to be Pakistani. However, this too is constructed in an atypical manner.
By creating a Pakistani villain who, diseased and with only three years left to live, threatens not only India, but also Pakistan itself, his character is pushed out of his national sphere and into the dustbin of history where all those who have ‘lost their national way’ are relegated by the film. His ‘de-nationalisation’, which is recognised in disgust by Padukone’s Pakistani protagonist, Rubai, mirrors the ‘anti-national’ stance of the Indian antagonist, John Abraham’s character, Jim. Abraham’s antagonist, who has the term ‘patriot’ tattooed crawling down his neck, was once himself a dedicated Indian soldier, fighting for the national cause in the same way that Shah Rukh Khan’s protagonist still does. However, in the case of Jim, the country for which he would have willingly and dutifully given his life, failed to protect the two things that were most precious to him: his wife, and their child still in her womb. His personal tragedy then becomes the reason for his insidious behaviour, which spurs the entire plot. Nonetheless, it is ultimately still India’s misdemeanour and reluctance – rather than inability – to protect its own that is the pivotal cause for his wrath, an extra layer that is missing from the characterisation of evil in the Pakistani antagonist. Both antagonists have personal vendettas, which pushes them to act in anti-national ways. This kind of careful balancing act between India and Pakistan is maintained throughout the movie.
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Therefore, although the entire premise of the film hangs on Pakistani character General Qadir’s mania being triggered by India’s revocation of Article 370, and the consequential threat of an Indian encroachment into Pakistan-administered Kashmir, his depiction as a tyrant who goes against his own national cause transforms the place of Kashmir in the film. When taken outside of the plot and placed against the tapestry of the film’s larger political stance, General Qadir becomes the film’s ventriloquist dummy, critiquing the action in Kashmir and the violation of the Indian constitution.
Moreover, when it comes to the question of personal identity and how religion fits into the idea of India today, the film addresses this directly. “Are you a Muslim?” Rubai enquires of Pathaan; his response is as politically lucid as his personal past is obscure: “I do not know what I am. All I know is that my country raised me.” Found abandoned in a cinema hall as a baby, much like the titular character in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest is found abandoned in a handbag at a railway station, the film does not dwell on the idea of religion beyond this concise statement, because the essential point has been made. As Shah Rukh Khan himself implied in a press interview, this film echoes an ‘Amar, Akbar, Anthony’ scenario, that captures the imaginary of secular India in a similar manner to how ‘liberty, equality, fraternity’ continues to be the commonly articulated reference to France.
In a national context, therefore, the place of Pathaan is somewhat atypical to the political norm of contemporary mass cultural produce. On an international plain, meanwhile, the place of India shifts again. With principal photography for the film beginning in 2020, prior to the onset of the 2022 Russia-Ukraine war, Pathaan’s declaration that Russia is, and always has been, a steadfast ally is geopolitically in line with India’s broader foreign policy. The editing team managed to change the script from ‘the Prime Minister’s Office’ (PMO) to ‘the Minister’s office’ when the actual PMO made noises about being represented in a film that did not toe the political line. Yet, they left in the many references to Russia’s importance for India. This too was not a careless detail that was absentmindedly overlooked. In fact, what the film makes up in its subtle approach to the idea of India, it loses in its unreflective treatment of international politics, missing the opportunity to take a stronger stance on India’s position in the world beyond its own borders.
Taken as an ensemble, Pathaan’s narrative is not politically innocuous. Released on the eve of Republic Day, the obvious politicised moments are unlikely to be missed by anyone, regardless of their reluctance to look beyond the bombastic character, and their resultant dismissal and dislike of, the film. Pathaan’s record-breaking performance and mass appeal are a clear marker of India’s general political mood. Pathaan had all the reasons to bomb at the box office: a cast comprised of stars who have long been in the current government’s disfavour, an unusual popular culture depiction of the India-Pakistan dynamic, and a ridiculously large film-making budget that might have been hard to breakeven. And yet, it broke several box office records in India, a current and continuing trend yet to reach its zenith, and has already become one of the top 10 highest grossing Indian films of all time.
This is Bollywood circling back to the ‘masala films’ for which it was reputed, with an updated travelogue, special effects, and wardrobe to suit its contemporary audience. Containing representation of all three ruling Khans of golden era Bollywood – the undefeated Shah Rukh Khan as protagonist, Salman Khan in cameo, and featuring Aamir Khan’s sister in a fleeting appearance in the symbolic role of Pathaan’s adoptive mother – this film is also a visual statement on the place of Bollywood in the world of Indian cinema. Upstaged by the phenomenal performance of Telugu films in India and abroad, Bollywood is nonplussed and may be in the process of reckoning with its own identity. It is perhaps the most fitting moment, therefore, for Bollywood to assess both its cultural and political place, for which Pathaan seems like just the ticket.
Statistically, enough people within India have seen it to comprise a large cross-section of its citizens, and the wide spectrum of political opinions that they represent. If solidarity with Shah Rukh Khan and/or Deepika Padukone was the principal reason for the film’s commercial success, as many have argued, that sentiment of camaraderie has reached far beyond the small community of voluble opponents of the BJP regime. This may not be intended as a politically intellectual film like Anubhav Sinha’s Article 15 (2019), nor an outrightly one-sided depiction of history such as The Kashmir Files (2022), but its dampened critique of the current status quo, housed within an inordinate patriotic display, has appealed to a far larger contingent of India’s public than either of the other two. And in that mass popularity lies its power.
As the clever epilogue metaphorically suggests in the discussion between Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan (or perhaps, as an aside, between their respective characters, Pathaan and “Tiger” Rathore), the purpose of this film is to entertain while staying (politically) relevant. It is so confident in its own outrageous version of fictionalised reality, that it does not take issue with being ridiculed so long as it can have the last word. It is moments such as this, when the sheer popularity of cultural products, like film, upstage other discourses deemed more ‘politically appropriate’ or ‘relevant’, that suggest that the idea of India amongst its populace may be more sagacious and multiplicitous than political polemics would imply. Pathaan might just have accomplished what no political opposition could.
Paroma Ghose has a PhD in history from the Graduate Institute, Geneva.
Seventy years of a post-colonial state is no small feat. It is an age which, statistics claim, the average Indian is not expected to reach. Yet, in its wizened years, India seems to be travelling along that well-trodden path towards short-sightedness and the exaggeration of those aspects of itself that embalm it in a heroic (if self-gratifying) glow. India has triumphed in the democratic experiment: fact. The checks and balances that hold it at a safe distance from absolutist tendencies have, thus far, held their ground. And somehow, despite the immensely different walks of life, diverging worldviews, languages, genders and education of its people, when the polls open, they are indiscriminate and left largely untampered. Such is the religion of a modern, secular, republican India. At least, that is the narrative. And there is truth in this perspective enough for every Indian to stand behind it and defend Indian democracy despite (or in spite of) all odds. There is, however, one political approach that is completely amiss: namely, nuance.