Opinion Aftermath of Dhurandhar shows — space for good-faith criticism in Indian cinema is shrinking
The power of the box office, public opinion and government backing all but overrode those who sought to draw attention to these films’ shortcuts, plotholes and disquieting ideologies. So who exactly is being persecuted here?
Dhurandhar is well on its way to earning Rs 400 crore. First, let’s dispense with the notion that there’s something wrong with any form of art, including cinema, espousing an ideology or emerging from a political worldview. The idea of art as something fragile, to be protected from the heat and dust of reality, became irrelevant in the late 19th-early 20th century when modernist movements challenged existing power structures and tore apart the illusion of neutrality. It is hard to imagine that any serious critic today would believe that for a work of art to qualify for greatness, it must be shorn of perspective, political and otherwise. Perspective, after all, is where meaning is made.
Now to the debate of the moment, which has been spurred by allegations that the non-rapturous reviews of Dhurandhar, or for that matter other recent films which have embraced an aesthetic of hyper-nationalism, violence and machismo — like The Kashmir Files (2022), The Kerala Story (2023), The Bengal Files (2025) and Section 370 (2024) — are motivated by political or ideological bias. Is it really the case that the refusal of a few to wax ecstatic over these films amounts to evidence of a culture of gatekeeping and the existence of a cabal that refuses to part with the keys to the citadel of taste?
Exercise even the smallest bit of scrutiny, and this assertion falls apart. Theatre attendance may not have bounced back to pre-pandemic levels, but these films have run to packed movie halls and broken box office records. Dhurandhar is well on its way to earning Rs 400 crore, while The Kashmir Files earned over Rs 250 crore and The Kerala Story, with just over Rs 240 crore, was the seventh-highest-grossing film of the year. Some, like The Kashmir Files and The Kerala Story have won awards, and many, including Chhaava (2025) and The Sabarmati Report (2024), were made tax-free in some states. The power of the box office, public opinion and government backing all but overrode those who sought to draw attention to these films’ shortcuts, plotholes and disquieting ideologies. So who exactly is being persecuted here? This sense of victimhood is especially baffling when juxtaposed with the ordeal of those accused of “offending” sentiments and forced into changing the titles of their films (Janaki V vs State of Kerala and Padmaavat) or making arbitrary cuts (Phule and Homebound).
It would be foolish to say that there is no gatekeeping. In cinema, like in other forms of art, there has always been an “establishment” that determines whose films — and what kind of films — are funded, made and distributed. But these gatekeepers are not unchanging; to assert otherwise would also be foolish. What we are seeing today, in fact, is the emergence of a new class of creators, one that is comfortably aligned with the popular mood or the dominant ideology or both, and yet feels besieged.
The question to ask, then, is: What do those who cry foul over a lukewarm review think they are being denied?
The answer, perhaps, lies in the nature of propaganda itself. Propaganda does not just seek approval, it demands moral submission. It emerges from a totalising worldview that perceives any attempt to puncture consensus as an existential threat. Seen this way, any review short of glowing becomes proof of sabotage or ideological bias.
This is not to say that propaganda cannot be art and that critics are infallible arbiters of artistic merit. Many classics of cinema, like Battleship Potemkin, The Hunt for Red October and even Top Gun, are overt or covert forms of propaganda — even ideologically abhorrent films, like The Birth of a Nation and Olympia, are considered technically and aesthetically accomplished. History is also littered with examples of critics being wrong in their appraisal of films that have endured as classics, challenged conventions and pushed the limits of the form. These are not contradictions, but the messy reality of cultural life.
Criticism is not persecution. It is not gatekeeping. The dangers of believing otherwise are already evident — witness the harassment faced by critics Anupama Chopra and Sucharita Tyagi over their less-than-effusive reviews of Dhurandhar. Actor-musician Saba Azad, too, was subjected to Islamophobic and sexist trolling over the political disagreement expressed by her partner, actor Hrithik Roshan, in his tweet about the film (never mind that his mild divergence came with a liberal slathering of praise for the film’s director and actors). What we are seeing is rapidly diminishing room for good-faith criticism. That, more than any negative review, is what should give us pause.
The writer is senior assistant editor, The Indian Express. pooja.pillai@expressindia.com
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