Rann: a review

In Rann, director Ram Gopal Varma attempts to expose how the country’s electronic media is increasingly sacrificing journalistic ethics at the altar of sordid sensationalism, all in a cut-throat bid to stay ahead in the TRP game.

But in an irony of sorts, the treatment of this relevant and sensitive subject is carried out in the same sensationalist — often over-the-top — manner that the maker of films like Company and Satya censures throughout the film. Overly dramatic and with a predilection for the hyperbolic, Rann is a film that promises too much and delivers too little.

With a linear narrative, unidimensional characters that are either too cardboard or too caricaturish and a been-there-seen-that feel from Madhur Bhandarkar’s Page 3, Corporate and Satta — and even Varma’s own Sarkar — the predictable Rann fails to impress for a large part of its 150 minutes.

To expose the sordid goings-on in the field of electronic journalism and the politician-businessman-media nexus that is claimed to be dictating the content and tenor of the news being dished out today, RGV pits idealistic channel honcho Vijay Harshvardhan Malik (Bachchan) against his morally corrupt son Jai (Sudeep). While the upright Malik Sr is unwilling to succumb to falsehood and sensationalism to save his news channel (India 24x7) from bankruptcy, Malik Jr is willing to stop at nothing — lies, deceit and even murder — to up his TRPs and steal the thunder from Ambrish Kakkar (Mohnish Behl), the unscrupulous head of a rival-and more successful-channel.

Frustrated with the idealistic patriarch, the son joins hands with his businessman brother-in-law Naveen (Rajat Kapoor) and corrupt Prime Minister-in-waiting Mohan Pandey (Rawal) to hatch a conspiracy that threatens to alter the political fabric of the country and catapult the channel to the top in the viewership game. Reduced to an ignorant puppet in his son’s hands, Malik Sr unknowingly becomes party to the murky mess as his equally idealistic protege Purab Shastri (Riteish) takes it upon himself to unearth the grisly truth.

Touching upon a novel subject, Rann had the potential to be a powerful drama, but like most of his films in the recent past, Varma squanders the opportunity by choosing sensation over substance. The moving scene of Bachchan chancing upon the truth and his subsequent 10-minute soliloquy in which he talks about the role and responsibility, the perils and pitfalls of the media sum up what Rann could have been.

Cinematographer Amit Roy shoots the film in muted grey and iridescent blue, but negates the good work by resorting to weird camera angles and unnecessary top shots that do nothing to heighten the drama. Add to that the pounding-into-the-brain background score — a RGV trademark — that is used (unnecessarily) in almost every minute of the film. Sample this: the background score heightens when a viewer picks up the TV remote, reaching a crescendo as his finger touches the power button!

Rann also suffers on account of the loopholes in the plot. Why would a man, hailed to be the best journalist in the country, run a tape implicating the head of state without checking the source or credentials? How is a cub reporter made part of the decision-making meetings of a channel? How does the second in command of a channel sell company secrets to a rival in full public view?

A film with as hard-hitting a subject as Rann should have relied on powerful dialogues, but the film falters on this count too. From “news ko masala banake becho” to “computer ke zamaane mein typewriter nahin chalta”, the lines vary from the trite to inane. And the less said about the lyrics, the better. “Big, big news, breaking news. Remote ko baahar phenk, sirf mera channel dekh,” goes a song!

Rann is resurrected by some of the performances, but even that is as inconsistent as the film. Saddled with a powerful role, southern star Sudeep shows promise in some scenes, but overdoes it for the most part. Paresh Rawal predictably handles the role of a Ray Ban-sporting corrupt politician well while Riteish Deshmukh’s character is too sketchy to make much of an impression. Rajat Kapoor ably reprises his Corporate role of a slimy industrialist. The women — from Gul Panag to Neetu Chandra to Suchitra Krishnamurthy to Simone Singh — function as mere props.

But in the end, if Rann is worth a watch, it is on account of one man. One man who has been at it for 40 years. From an ageing idealist holding on to his principles in the face of adversity and opposition to a helpless father reduced to a pawn in his son’s hands to a true citizen willing to sacrifice family for nation, Bachchan makes the Rann journey worthwhile. Almost.

Priyanka Roy, t2