Jaggi

This brave and fascinating film was not what I'd have expected to come out of India. That it did gives me hope that the societal mores are loosening in a more liberal direction despite the bleakness of the subject matter of the film.

There are two strands that we can see in the drama. The first is the perversion of human relationships and sexuality caused by artificial local conventions that have been engendered by religion. The other is the personal story of a country boy suffering from erectile disfunction or who is asexual and his subsequent life of being used by other boys as he's mistaken for being gay. That we know from the IMDb storyline. No one understands his problem. Not the village boys, not his parents, no one.

Horror is piled on horror; how could anyone bear such dreadful hurts that he is subjected to? The climax of the film shows that it's impossible to carry on after the catalyst of a proposed forced marriage.

The actors and actresses playing the roles were uniformly excellent despite their seeming lack of history on film sites. The dialogue was apt and the subtitles good. As a glimpse into the darker side of rural life in the Punjab this couldn't be bettered especially as the subject is so taboo and rarely touched on.

This is a definite recommend.