Shahana Goswami delivers a performance of surprising emotional depth
The cop drama gets a pronounced transformation SatisfiedBritish-Indian director Sandhya Suri’s debut fiction feature, a Hindi-language film starring Shahana Goswami and Sunita Rajwar in previously unplayed roles.
The film delves into the rural boondocks of North India and examines religious prejudice, caste discrimination, abuse of power, custodial torture and gender dynamics in a police station and the communities it serves.
Suri’s perceptive script places two policewomen – one a hardened professional who has seen it all, the other struggling with half-truths and unspoken lies – at the center of a story that explores a broken system that is manipulated as they wish. Exercising power, be it social, political or administrative. They determine the substance and course of the trial and the police force plays a role as well.
A recently widowed woman, Santosh Saini (Shahana Goswami), joins the force out of compassion. Before even stepping into the job, the constable finds himself in the middle of a sensitive crime investigation.
A Dalit girl was raped and murdered in the village. The investigation is led by a tough female inspector, Geeta Sharma (Sunita Rajwar) – addressed as ‘Sharmaji’ – who is not averse to getting her hands dirty in the cesspools around her.
Satisfied Set in a state called Chirag Pradesh. The cities in which the story takes place – Nehrat, Mapur, Madrabad, Ghazalabad, Machogarh – bear fictional names. Apart from the real-world parallels of these places, everything in between Satisfied grounded in reality.
It is a police method that is not constrained by genre conventions. Indeed, it is defined by a persistent abandonment of the rules of form. Santosh is a slow and moving commentary on the evils of a society where prejudices of many kinds are rampant, often with dire consequences. But life goes on.
Satisfied Pursues both the individual and the collective with equal rigor, revealing the fault lines that the new policewoman must understand and deal with as her superior, a woman with years of experience under her belt, not just a bit of hand-holding but the newbie’s. Goes out of his way to make things easy.
The bond that develops between the two women in a male-dominated force also reveals marked differences in the attitudes of the two policemen. Santosh is an outsider. He was just taken by the men at the police station. But he soldiers on. In contrast, Sharma is the boss. The irresistible lady calls the shots. He seems keen to mold Santosh in his own image.
Apart from mourning the loss of her police-husband in the line of duty, Santosh is confronted with the indifference and insanity of the men, in uniform and otherwise, she works with. He learns the ropes pretty quickly but can’t shake the feelings of guilt and frustration that come with the territory.
An illiterate Dalit man approaches the police to report the disappearance of his only daughter. He all but shed away. Santosh comes forward and offers to help the helpless father. But how far can she go in the face of her male colleagues’ reluctance to serve the all-round and scrappy?
Earlier, a girl comes to the police station to complain about a cheating boyfriend. The girl’s father, who doesn’t have a way of missing the Dalit girl’s father, bribes a policeman to punish the ‘errant’ boy immediately. Santosh can only see.
Amidst the injustices her male subordinates perpetrate with impunity, Sharma is seen as a woman who supports the rightful principal. However, as the case progresses and Santosh descends deeper and deeper into the moral gray area, he begins to realize that no one in the police force, not even his apparently benign mentor, is free of blemishes.
Racial oppression and poverty hide in plain sight in contentment. The film also sheds light on the casual manner in which religious rifts are normalized in a divided society. “It happens,” a worried Sharma tells Santosh when the probe is avoided.
Defending an unstoppable act, Sharma reminds Santosh that there are two types of “untouchables” in this country – those you don’t touch and those you can’t touch. The war between the two is not only unequal but endless.
A repeatedly desecrated well in a Dalit village is a site of continued upper caste oppression. A mutilated body was found in it. A rotting cat and a dead dog are thrown into it. The community that uses the well is angry but powerless. They know they have to be at the receiving end because the village’s impregnable upper castes can get away with murder.
Satisfied There is no background score. Two songs played on the audio system of Inspector Sharma’s official car are meant to break the seriousness of the two policewomen’s work. In the silence, ambient noises, especially the landing of a defendant’s back with an off-camera police baton, become more chilling.
Shahana Goswami delivers a performance of surprising emotional depth. He brings out the inner turmoil of the title character, a genius who must find his way in a world beset by corruption and exploitation, with restraint. The way he recruits is measured and meaningful.
Sunita Rajwar, a victim of typecasting in Hindi films and web shows as a loud-mouthed termagant, digs her teeth into a meaty and layered role that allows her to leave much unsaid. He brings a work that sharpens the inquisitiveness that the film navigates through the tension and stress of policing a diverse and divided country.
