Subhash K. Jha talks about I Am

By Subhash K. Jha - April 25, 2011 - 3:59 PM IST

Amazingly, Onir goes through the three phases in Abhimanyu's life, as the abused child going on to a manipulative adolescent and thence to whining adulthood, in just about 15-20 minutes of playing-time. Portable epic, indeed! This story also has the most intriguing array of actors, from Suri as the grownup permanently-wounded Abhimanyu to Zain Salam as the adolescent Abhimanyu to Anurag Kashyap as the sexual molestor, to Shernaz Patel as the mother in denial and Radhika Apte as Suri's bohemian sounding-board who knows she may not be able to have sex with the man she so openly loves because of his tortured past. Whose locks is it anyway?

The sexual candour of this episode makes for remarkable viewing. Onir desists from making any judgement on those who scar the wounded. And really, who are we to wonder what lies beneath the surface of the simmering sexual politics of that overrated universe known as domesticity?

The rawest most guttural and devastating story is saved for the last. I Am Omar is a story straight out of every gay person's favourite nightmare. While making out in a car with his newly acquired toyboy Omar (Arjun Mathur) Jai (Rahul Bose) is accosted by a vulgar homophobic cop.

Here we must pause to note that Abhimanyu Singh as the cop on the bawdy beat comes up with the most bludgeoning performance in the film. His filthy language and his even filthier intentions towards the cowering gay man are brought out by the actor with a ferocity and clarity that provide an entirely new definition to credible characterization.

This story is shot with the quivering conviction of a crime reporter with a video camera who has suddenly chanced on a scene of atrocity that far exceeds his call of duty. The enormity of the crime is represented in the beads of sweat that appear on the victim of the police atrocity's brow. Rahul Bose is full of righteous damnation.

The stench of fear and discrimination is the strongest in the last story, almost as if Onir wants to leave us with a feeling of foreboding and guilty.

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