No Monkeying Around
Despite its acclaim abroad, the fate of Dev Patel’s Monkey Man still hangs in a limbo in India. Afreen Kabir writes about the certification board’s controversial decisions and the Indian state’s larger attitudes towards artistic dissent.
Dev Patel’s writer and directorial debut feature Monkey Man was the talk of the town when it premiered at South x South West Film Festival earlier this year. The film is unlike anything Patel has ever done, and it wowed viewers with the novelty of the story, juxtaposed against jam-packed, extreme violence. Produced by Jordan Peele, Monkey Man has also seen a stellar theater run in the USA and other countries; however it still awaits a theatrical release in India—the country of Patel’s origin and the setting for the film.
The delay isn’t suspicious per se, but the behavior of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) is. Originally slated to hit Indian theatres on April 19, 2024, the board has postponed it for a later release, citing reasons that most Bollywood films are routinely subjected to: intense violence, some sexually explicit scenes, and for its allusions to Hindu mythology.
For the former two, most Bollywood films accept their cuts and make the necessary changes. Makarand Deshpande—who plays Monkey Man’s antagonist Baba Shakti—says that the General Elections in India were the likely the cause for the delay in release. The reality is in contrary to his assumption here as well, as if the CBFC were concerned with the film’s potential of impacting voter mindset or behavior. Prior to the elections, the board saw no problem in clearing films Swatantra Veer Savarkar, Bastar: The Naxal Story, and Article 370 in March, all political narratives that echo and propagate the ruling party’s agenda and ideology. A Bollywood fan will always question the need of films like Savarkar, a biopic on the Hindutva icon. A film like this is okayed at a time when India’s communal fabric is holding itself together with a few fragile strands. But Monkey Man—which takes a stand against India’s corrupt governance—was given a blow.
The growth of boycott culture is a result of the deterioration of India’s democratic ideals and structure. It is in this twisted web that Monkey Man finds itself entangled in, another blow to India’s dwindling reputation for free speech.
Monkey Man, like a number of recent films produced in India, is being met with the concern of allegedly outraging Hindu beliefs—a phenomenon growing at an alarming rate. Forget Dev Patel: even Shahrukh Khan, the longstanding ‘Baadshah’ of Bollywood, too, was victim to this ‘outrage’, too. Making a comeback after four years, Khan’s action/thriller Pathaan (2023) saw a boycott—a consequence of allegedly outraging Hindu sentiments—from a subsection of the audience. (This outrage primarily stepped from a sequence where actress Deepika Padukone donned an orange bikini in the song “Besharam Rang”). But despite the small concentration of the outraged, this section of the audience is very loud and prompt: nowadays, it has almost become an everyday occurrence to call for film’s boycott, often over bizarre and arbitrary reasons. The practice has led to even stars voicing their concerns about the situation, who have had to beg moviegoers not to boycott their films.
Streaming giant Netflix was originally set to release Monkey Man digitally, but, reportedly, backed off in fear of a backlash. This decision came not long after Annapoorani, a Tamil film starring Nayanthara that was removed from Netflix within a month after its release: Nayanthara’s character in the film is a Hindu Brahmin, who cooks and consumes meat. It should be alarming that even a massive streaming platform like Netflix has been forced to think twice before releasing any content similarly deemed sensitive or offensive.
The boycott culture is yet to be receive any preventive measures, as it is sometimes being spearheaded by political figures themselves. BJP leaders in Prayagraj, Maharashtra, and Indore called for a ban on Pathaan. They gathered and burnt effigies of the two leads in the film. Khan, fortunately, has an immensely loyal and deep-rooted fanbase to bank upon, which made Pathaan one of Hindi cinema’s highest grossing films. Dev Patel, however, does not have such a luxury in India. While he may have wowed the global audience—including the Indian diaspora—Patel has had to deal with a hurdle unique to film releases in India.
The growth of boycott culture (on religious grounds) is a result of the deterioration of India’s democratic ideals and structure. It is in this twisted web that Monkey Man finds itself entangled in, another blow to India’s dwindling reputation for free speech.
Monkey Man is an artistic representation of India. The film’s protagonist Kid—aka Bobby—seeks revenge on a guru-turned-politician for the murder of his mother and the unjust power-grabbing over his village. The film’s core is akin to any ‘masala’ Bollywood film of the yesteryears, where heroes beat up bad guys (who had tortured their parents), fueled by vindication and anger.
Patel features an alternate-universe version of Mumbai as Yatana. Here, one simply cannot ignore the divide between the rich and poor, as one can very easily in Mumbai. He also platforms India’s third-gender or hijra community under a spotlight seldom used in Bollywood. The hijras nurse Kid back to health after a near-death incident, and they help train him physically and mentally. In a temple nestled away in a forest, Kid understands through them that the fight is not his alone.
While promoting the film on The Tonight Show, Patel mentioned that Monkey man is essentially about the “marginalized” coming together to challenge the “status quo.” Here’s Kid, along with an army of hijras, fighting a politician/religious guru who enjoys a lot of power. This is a reality that India has seen quite often in the recent years: The CAA-NRC protest in 2019, the farmers’ protest in 2021 and the wrestlers’ protest in 2023. While the first term of BJP rule went by without much resistance from dissenters, things were not so quiet in the party’s second term post 2019.
With these elements in its narrative structure, the movie was bound to face a backlash in our country.
Religion is an indispensable part of Indian politics, and the politicization of faith has contributed to the ruling party winning the past three elections. The glorification of religion and unbridled power act as a disguise for politicians, many of whom have multiple criminal cases filed against them. For example, the BJP fielded Brij Bhushan Singh’s son as a candidate from Singh’s constituency this year, despite the popular and emotional protest against him. Singh was accused of sexual assault by female Indian wrestlers, and a failure to get appropriate action led the wrestlers to consider dumping their medals into the Ganga.
Monkey Man, at its core, is a form of artistic, emotional protest, too. The film seeks to highlight how the weak are inspired to act against a strong and suffocating oppression, to show the potential of the underdog masses in challenging those in power. The film also hints at the need for dissent to encourage a mass upheaval in bringing about a change, which is a problem that is seen only by concerned citizens in India. The Lok Sabha suspended a record number of opposition parliamentarians for demanding a response about last year’s Parliamentary breach. Looking back, that incident, too, mirrors the core principle of Monkey Man: The accused were inspired by Bhagat Singh’s infamous bombing of the Delhi assembly, upset by the state’s stance on the farmers protest, the riots in Manipur and other crises.
Yes, Monkey Man is similar to many classic Bollywood revenge narratives, which should be no problem for the state. But in drawing Western attention to the truth behind Indian politics, the film has been a sour pill for the CBFC.
It is regrettable that the Indian audience is being deprived of a wonderful film, one jampacked by Indian culture and influences. Pirated copies of Monkey Man are available online now, and Indian viewers have flocked to third-party and torrent sites to watch it. The response has been overwhelmingly positive.
Patel has always made it clear that Monkey Man is his labour of love, and is a tribute to his Indian heritage. He has repeatedly maintained that the core of the film is Hanuman’s vulnerability to weakness, until he was able to rise in power to fight for himself. Kid carries that inspiration with him while fighting people in the underground boxing ring—in a monkey mask—and those that took his childhood away from him.
Alas, despite its acclaim abroad, Monkey Man’s fate still hangs in a limbo in India. The certification board’s behavior is telling of the state’s attitude to any ideas of dissent—fictional or not. It’s not every day that a Hollywood film is made with a close perspective about India. Dev’s film offers an artistic, alternate universe-esque feel to our country; and yet, it manages to address real-world issues. In the perfect world, such a film should have been appreciated—if not lauded—by the Indian government.
Before the film’s international release, Deshpande had revealed that Patel had removed a pivotal scene from the film for political reasons. Patel said that it was a scene he “loved the most,” and Deshpande thought it was the “soul of the movie” for the debut director. The exclusion of this scene is a reminder of how this entire saga has caused a grand loss for art, where compromises were made not for public appreciation, but simply for the permission to be exhibited to the masses.
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Afreen Kabir is an aspiring entertainment journalist, currently interning with Springtide Magazine, a youth-centric platform. You can find her on Instagram: @afreenkabir.
