Those keenly waiting to finally watch a movie revolving around Mithali, one of women’s cricket’s most iconic contemporary players, will certainly be left asking for more.
Shabaash Mithu opens with a dejected Mithali Raj (Taapsee Pannu), drenched in sweat, sprinting through the quiet lanes of Hyderabad. The film hits the rewind button where we get a peek into Mithali’s childhood. When a young, exquisite Mithali strikes a friendship with the sharp-tongued, tomboy Noorie at her classical dance classes, little does she know that it would change the course of her life forever.
Amid sessions of ‘nritta’, ‘natya’ and ‘nritya’, the girls sneak out to play cricket at an abandoned ground where a washing paddle is their cricket bat, and stones lying there double up as their fielders. During one such match, Mithali’s exceptional cricketing skills catch the eye of Samrat (Vijay Raaz), a cricket coach. He offers to take Mithali and Noorie under his wings. While Mithali’s father agrees to this, Noorie keeps it a secret from her family.Years pass by, and this ‘Sachin-Kambli’ duo is now slowly making their mark with the bat and ball. However, owing to certain circumstances, only Mithali gets selected in the Indian National Women’s Team. What follows next is the journey of her glorious career which is marked with hits and misses.
Shabaash Mithu is the perfect example of how the Hindi film biopic can never just be that. In Bollywood, biopics turn into code words for wholesome entertainers. They are mandated to fulfil other duties, simultaneously resembling a love story, a family drama, and a coming of age adventure. Srijit Mukherji’s biopic on the trail blazing female cricketer who disrupted and dominated the country’s favourite male dominated sport follows this pattern. The film captures Mithali Raj as a friend, sister, daughter, a Bharatnatyam dancer who applies her dance lessons to cricket, and an untiring supporter of gender equality. What we never get to see, however, is Mithali Raj the youngest captain in the history of international cricket as a protagonist. As a cricketer coming onto her own. As a remarkable woman who isn’t only defined by her extraordinary actions or struggles.
There’s not much invention in either the film’s plot or its form. Mukherjee recounts the retired cricketer’s life in a linear fashion, dividing it into three parts, focusing on her childhood discovery of the sport, the years she spent in the national camp as a rookie player, and finally her tenure in the national team leading up to her comeback and eventual retirement. On paper, the film covers more than three decades in Mithali’s life but it’s hard to tell that on screen: Not only do characters refuse to age in Shabaash Mithu but the proceedings itself betray no hold over the passage of time. Years are condensed into minutes and integral phases of life are packaged in saccharine montages. Mithali’s career for instance is reduced to a choppy highlight reel, embodying the absolute rock-bottom of biopic filmmaking.
That is to say Shabaash Mithu becomes the kind of sports biopic that believes it is making a statement even when it says nothing about the life led by its protagonist. It doesn’t tell a story as much as it engineers one by fetishising the gender of its protagonist. The film isn’t interested in just depicting Mithali Raj’s incredible career and comeback as much as it fixated with underlining one thing: Mithali Raj is a woman.
The movie doesn’t amply showcase those edge of the seat, nail biting moments that would have unfolded in her life, especially during the 2017 world cup. Those keenly waiting to finally watch a movie revolving around Mithali, one of women’s cricket’s most iconic contemporary players, will certainly be left asking for more. Maybe a rerun of one of her milestone matches will help.
Click the link below to watch the trailer.
Content sources- theHindu.com firstpost.com koimoi.com
