What is it about Mirch Masala that is so tantalizing and engaging? Is it the congregation of these beautiful women in a Gujarati village, all strong and yet lorded over by the rules of a patriarchal society? 38 years after it was made Ketan Mehta’s Mirch Masala remains an enigmatic mesmeric parable on women’s rights. On the topmost level of perception it’s an excellent thriller about a bunch of very attractive women who try to hide from a dangerous predator.
Like those teen-slasher cheesy sex films where under-dressed girls scamper across dark corridors as a gruesome monster runs after them, Mirch Masala on its uppermost level as a parable on predatoriness.
Mirch Masala is in reality a metaphor on individual space. Through the unforgettable character of Sonbai(Smita Patil) director Ketan Mehta delineates a quirky, compelling satirical drama on sex and the not-so-single girl whose right to say no to a powerful predator eventuates in a battle of the sexes which culminates in a kind of defiant feminist protest that today’s post-Nora Ephron generation of assertive women would find hard to applaud as anything but a token gesture of defiance.
When Sonbai flees the lecherous tyrannical tax-collector, played with moustache-twirling glee by Naseeruddin Shah, she seeks asylum in a chilli factory where she’s cocooned from the extraneous threat that looms large in her life mainly because her husband (Raj Babbar in a guest appearance) has left her in the village for a job in the city.
A still from Mirch Masala |
The fact that Sonbai is infinitely attractive doesn’t help her escape the libidinous Subedaar’s insistent attentions. More than a gripping gender skirmish set against a flaming-red backdrop of ripe chillies Mirch
Masala is a profoundly seductive tale populated by some of the most attractive women you’ve seen under one cinematic roof. Ketan, known to have an eye for physical beauty, chose actresses who could blend into the rural Gujarati milieu without losing any of their innate charm. Sisters Ratna and Supriya Pathak are part of the chilli factory’s fabulous feminine sisterhood. Towering above them all is Smita Patil, the runaway enchantress who seeks refuge in a haven of communal muliebrity.Brilliant in her own space, Deepti Naval stays outside the chilli factory.
A still from Mirch Masala |
Though the film ‘belongs’ to Smita’s sensuously sublime Sonbai, Deepti leaves a lasting impression. The sequence where she pounds her hands in helpless anguish against the window in the room where she is imprisoned by her husband, is spine-tingling. Are rural women, even if they are wage-earners like Ketan Mehta’s characters, entitled to a life of their choice? Deepti’s husband played with remarkable restrain by Suresh Oberoi, is the village mukhiya. He doles out justice to the entire village. But has none to offer to his own wife. Her impotent rage contrasts with telling resonance against Smita Patil’s defiant protest against a state-sponsored brute’s egoistic determination to “have” her at any cost. When the village mukhiya coaxes her to give in, Sonbai says she would rather die than succumb. The mukhiya reminds Sonbai that even if her husband was present he’d have told her to satiate the Subedaar.“And I would have said no to my husband’s request as well,” Sonbai spits back.
The Subedaar’s power-hungry mechanization are manoeuvred by a tremendous satire. The cheesy Subedaar has lately bought himself a miracle machine known as the Gramophone(the film is set in pre-Independence India). He plays his 78 rpm records on his new toy(a record player) to terrorize villagers and seduce their women. He is the rogue element sanctioned by the State to perpetrate a power that he is ill-equipped to use.He therefore ends up looking ludicrous in his self-importance.Mirch Masala makes excessive power look ridiculous and funny.
When the Subedaar decides to break down the chilli factory’s gate he thinks he’s breaking Sonbai’s defences. Absolute power doesn’t just corrupt absolutely. It also blinds. No wonder the women throw chilli powder into the sickening Subedaar’s lustful eyes at the end. He can’t see his own brutish arrogance anyway.
Mirch Masala Trivia: Smita Patil’s last film, she died before its release. Mohan Gokhale who plays the Mukhiya Suresh Oberoi’s kid brother also died very young, at the age of 40. Suresh Oberoi won the National award for the Mukhiya’s role. One can see Paresh Rawal who later played Sardar Patel in Ketan Mehta’s bio-pic as one of the villagers. Dina Pathak and both her daughter Ratna and Supriya Pathak were in the film. The only time they all appeared together in one film. Om Puri was only 30 when he played the 80-year old watchman of the chilli factory.
