The Sabarmati Report Review: Vikrant Massey’s Film Is A Weak Attempt At Uncovering The Truth, Falls Woefully Short

There are a few traits of most Indian films that turn it from potentially mediocre into full blown garbage. Some of these traits are: unnecessary humor interested in crucial moments just for the sake of it, overtly emotional background score letting the audience know that they’re supposed to feel sad, silly slow motion shots, a ‘love story’ that isn’t required but forced because, ‘what’s a film with a love story, right?’ All of this is true for The Sabarmati Report; a film whose original director exited the project because he wasn’t happy with its creative direction, and now we can understand why.

Firstly, making a film about a sensitive subject like the Godhra train burning – a planned incident that led to even more violence – is quite impossible in India because it will hurt sentiments of people across the nation, who would then protest and demand it be banned. And, as a result, we rarely see films dealing with sensitive or controversial incidents that have transpired across Indian history. Juxtapose this with the kind of historical dramas that are made in other free nations of the world, where people are capable of having a discussion or thinking for their own self rather than jumping onto the streets to light public property on fire. This holds back filmmakers and producers, especially in the mainstream, from tackling any controversial subjects. And, when they do tackle a controversial subject, they aren’t really committed. Their attempts are half-baked. With The Sabarmati Report, the case is the same.

But, the fact is that one side of the political spectrum will label this film’s makers ‘cowards,’ or chastise them for showing ‘half-truths’ while the other side will call it ‘propaganda’ because they’re not instantly absolved of all their hatred and sins.

While Vikrant Massey is a good actor, and brings a certain level of realness to his role, it cannot surpass a certain level of mediocrity owing to the poor writing of his character. While the film claims to examine the truth behind the Godhra train burning incident, it doesn’t really do so. Instead, it delves into Hindi vs. English media, alcoholism, and some form of a love story that really serves to annoy the audience. When you leave the theater, you don’t really learn anything new about what happened on 27 February 2002. In fact, there’s no mention of any of the real-life developments and investigations that happened into the incident, which is rather bewildering. There’s no examination of how, what, and why!

But, again, the makers are walking on eggshells. You cannot let any one group, political or religious, get upset at what’s been shown and, hence, the producers decide they’d show nothing. Instead, they pivot the entire movie towards some other issue. Like, the media. The media ends up being the punching bag. And while the media isn’t faultless and their role must be examined, they’re just one aspect of it, not the inception of the incident. Much like in Rajkumar Hirani’s Sanju – which pretty much told the audience that Sanjay Dutt was a naïve fool who was tricked into snorting cocaine by his friend and was made to seem like a bad boy by the media – The Sabarmati Report tells you that, in 2002, grassroots Hindi journalism sucked, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

The amount of material to sift through to make a film about the unfortunate event that The Sabarmati Report deals with is unending. Committee reports, court documents, eye witness testimonies, research books, scholars on both sides of the issue and their findings; but The Sabarmati Report hardly makes use of any of it. Compare it to Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) by Stanley Kramer, and you’d see the giant difference between their intentions; one’s a mainstream Bollywood cash grab, while the other is truly an honest film.

The next time a mainstream Bollywood producer decides to make a film about a real life incident that would surely stir unimaginable controversy, either hire better writers, or just stick to making Kyaa Kool Hain Hum. You’d rake in the moolah anyway.

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