3 days ago
Toxic’s Ambitious Crime Thriller Becomes Its Own Monster
Toxic is a crime movie about a violent man named Raya.
The director wanted to question the usual movies that make tough, violent men look heroic.
The reviewer says the movie often becomes too similar to those same films.
Raya has many relationships, but the women around him are not given enough stories of their own.
The movie is very long and its plot can be difficult to follow.
It uses a child named Ticket to show Raya’s guilt and troubled mind.
The story also contains ideas from Hamlet and the seven deadly sins.
The reviewer still praises the movie’s detailed sets, camera work and some of its deeper ideas.
Overall, the film is seen as ambitious but unsuccessful in fully achieving its goals.
Geetu Mohandas’ 194-minute film attempts to challenge hypermasculine Indian action spectacles through Yash’s character, Raya.
The review criticizes the film’s incoherent writing, weak character arcs, excessive slow motion, loud music and uneven editing.
Raya’s relationships with Nadia, Ganga, Rebecca, Elizabeth and Mellisa are portrayed as central to him, leaving the women underdeveloped.
The film can be read as an inverted fairy tale about the seven sins and as a commercial retelling of Hamlet.
Despite its flaws, the review highlights Rajeev Ravi’s cinematography, the production design, costumes and the film’s psychological themes of guilt and accountability.
- Who
- Director Geetu Mohandas, actor and co-writer Yash, and the cast led by Yash as Raya.
- What
- A review of Toxic, a 194-minute crime thriller that attempts to critique hypermasculine commercial action films while exploring violence, guilt and family.
- Where
- The film includes settings such as the Royale Circus and Macau, while the review examines its fictional story world.
- When
- Why
- Mohandas appears to be attempting to subvert the hypermasculine Indian star-vehicle template and examine the consequences of a violent man’s actions.
Critical assessment
Thematic defense
Challenge to macho cinema
Critical assessment
The film ultimately reproduces the ultra-violent, hypermasculine template it appears to oppose.
Thematic defense
Its story and psychological subtexts attempt to make a violent protagonist confront guilt, failure and the consequences of his actions.
Narrative execution
Critical assessment
The review describes the writing as sloppy and incoherent, with underdeveloped characters, unexplained plot devices and inconsistent genre choices.
Thematic defense
The film’s ambiguity, including the possibility that Ticket is a fragment of Raya’s mind, allows for deeper readings involving memory, guilt and death.
Portrayal of women
Critical assessment
The female characters are largely defined through their relationships with Raya, while the sexualisation and framing of women reflect a male gaze.
Thematic defense
The film presents women as part of Raya’s morally compromised world and includes adult sexual relationships, although the review argues this does not sufficiently give them independent character development.
Key facts
- Film
- Toxic
- Director
- Geetu Mohandas
- Lead actor
- Yash, as Raya
- Runtime
- 194 minutes
- Screenplay
- Credited in the review to Yash and Geetu Mohandas
- Central themes
- Hypermasculinity, guilt, family, violence and accountability
- Noted technical strengths
- TP Abid’s production design, Rajeev Ravi’s cinematography and the costume design
Quotes
Rebecca
Raya’s official partner in Toxic, played by Tara Sutaria.
“Will a selfish person like you ever fall in love?”
indianexpress.com
Geetu Mohandas
The director, who dedicated Toxic to her father with this note.
“It wasn’t easy, but you were mine, and I was yours”
indianexpress.com
Sources
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