Ishq- Does it mislead?

By

Vishwesh Devadas

Ishq is just another chapter in Mollywood’s fabled love of slapping moral policing right across the face. But in its effort to strip through the judgmental society, did this revenge drama buttress the walls of a bigger evil? Sadly, yes.

So for anyone who has not seen the movie, your journey ends here unless you are too lazy to scroll by. Ishq is an open book from the beginning, Shiney Tom Chacko as the creepy local malayali that resonate with every flapping lungi, convinced me that anyone can loot an ignorant couple found in a not-so-compromising situation. But that’s where it misleads, it criminalizes the whole incident without giving any explanation.

With the never ending torture sessions being rather redundant, it sought to another gimmick of threatening to gang rape the girl. The gang is a random Bengali workers passing by. In the times when we try to break every time barrier for a woman, was this scene misleading? Does it actually reflect on our society? I doubt it. The perfectly incapable girl is at the mercy of a dangerous local and an even more dangerous boyfriend.  And then the hero aka boyfriend plots the revenge.

Psychos can have innumerable variation, the loud ones like Shammi in kumbalangi nights or something similar to Sachi in this movie. If the hero could traumatize a welcoming housewife and a Kid for the wrongdoings of the man, then the it loses its whole relevance. The lady of the house, who has absolutely nothing to do with this story is served the same punishment. The blaring background music and the slow motion at the end was more than enough to comprehend the emotional erection the markers get out of a meaningless gory revenge story. The film redeems itself with a logical climax. Either this could be an elaborate plan if implicitly pointing at an inner politics that reveals egoistic psychos, or a movie that advocates the butchery of a family in the name of revenge. Bottom line, there are better ways to fight moral policing.