The Burden of Masculinity in A Death in the Gunj

Aakshi Magazine
Jul 10, 2017 · 6 min read

In the initial moments of Konkona Sen Sharma’a A Death in the Gunj, the camera often pans out to focus on an external object — a portable stereo or the house from afar. The film’s opening scene has already told us there has been a death, but we don’t know who has died, or how. We don’t know if this is a ghost story or a murder mystery, and who the culprit is.

As the film gradually builds its atmosphere, using camera work and background music effectively, it plays with these expectations. At one point, it even has the protagonists sit together and decide to call dead spirits, followed by a local folk song evoking the idea of ghosts. Soon though, as we start getting to know its wonderfully crafted and acted characters, we realise that the danger in fact is not external — it lurks within. It exists within the world of the film’s well adjusted adults- Vikram, Nandu, Bonnie, Mimi, Brian and the elderly couple, the Bakshis. It is there in the learnt ways of the men, as they go about the business of being men, in the process othering and bullying anyone who has not learnt these rules.

When we want to express our resentment and frustration, it is often taken out on the person we identify as least likely to fight back. This usually gets decided by the other person’s location (class, caste, gender) or personality. Anyone who is introvert-ish, or perhaps non-assertive, for instance, would have experienced this sometime or the other . Shutu, the film’s fragile protagonist, beautifully acted by Vikrant Massey is that person. As we watch the small and big ways in which people around him constantly belittle him and shut him out, the film’s empathetic screenplay makes sure that we notice this, that we notice his helplessness, even if the film’s protagonists do not. It is heartbreaking to watch.

The film traces the arc of Shutu’s character as his mind gives way and deteriorates, unable to cope. He is anyway fragile to begin with, grieving his father’s death. The final straw is his failed attempt at becoming a part of this well adjusted world, in the process loosing out even on the friendship he had with the young Tani. The confident tone in which he tells Mimi, the woman he has a crush on, “I’ll be coming to Cal soon. So I’ll see you there”, hides his desperation. He was assuming that maybe she would have been his entry into that elusive feeling of belonging somewhere. But Mimi, single, older woman, in love with the married Vikram, is fighting her own struggles. “I really think you should be concentrating on your studies a little more”, she tells him in a tone that is meant to put him in place, implying that she thinks he is worth nothing. Earlier she had told him that he is so pretty, he could be a girl. The equation of his gentleness with his being not “manly” enough, is spot on. Shutu’s response had been a frown, like a grimace. He is not sure why she would say something like this, and whether she means it nicely.

Set in 1970s McCluskieganj, Sen-Sharma’s direction shows great observation skills, for instance when it comes to language. I was struck by the effortless way in which the film uses English, Hindi, Bengali and Chota Nagpuri, decided by the class people belong to, but also age and time and space. The first time we hear Hindi, for instance, is not only when Nandu talks to Manya, their domestic help, but also with the parents and between the parents. Language is not just what is spoken, but also how it is spoken — Shutu sounds different in his alone moments with Tani, he has a confident tone with her, in contrast to how he talks with adults.

But the film is not just about an individual character and his unravelling, and this is what makes it remarkable. It is thoughtful and searching as it tries to understand the ways in which power gets perpetuated and played out in families, among friends, in the oppressive and often cruel world that adulthood can be. It is no coincidence that it is the child, Tani, who recognizes pain while others see it as normal. Tani is the one who is upset when Shutu gets a rap on the head when he doesn’t drive well, she is the one who bursts out crying when a game of kabaddi takes an ugly turn. Only she can see the sheer violence of it. Adults are too much a part of it.

The film therefore is also about the insidious manner in which masculinity is learnt and passed on — ‘boys will be boys’ as their mother says by way of explaining the kabaddi fight. The kabaddi sequence itself is revelatory, as it gets both revealed and confirmed to us that something is not right with Shutu. As their mother reads a concerned letter from Shutu’s mother, the voice-over (in Aparna Sen’s voice) is superimposed on Shutu playing kabaddi with the rest outside. In that sequence, we are shown Shutu’s exhilaration as he feels like he belongs, smiling in a way we won’t see him again, perhaps even forgetting that he had been picked last in the game. The voiceover and background score underlines that Shutu and his mental state is a central concern of the film, and that something is going to happen, something momentous.

Intriguingly, the background score also seems to treat this like it is a mystery. So let’s stay with this mystery, and ask- what is not right with Shutu? Is it only about him? Or is it also about Nandu, whose unnecessary power play with Shutu over a mere driving lesson tells us how he became the man he is. ‘This is how you learn’, he tells his daughter Tani when she protests at how he treats Shutu. Or about Vikram, who might appear cool, but who is married to someone he hides from his friends. Who seems to have married not out of choice but pressures of lineage, while he continues to be involved with Mimi.

Or also about the father, the hardly visible, almost absent patriarch figure played by Om Puri. He is shown as always on the outside of all major decisions, perpetually drunk or passed out, not involved even in moments of crisis like the disappearance of his grand daughter. Perhaps he has given up after years of having to exert control, like men often do.

A moment between Nandu and him comes to mind. Nandu and Shutu are playing chess late into the night, when he walks into the room, looking for something. Nandu is a bit harsh towards him, exerting a sense of power. ‘Go to sleep. What do you even want’, he asks his Baba in irritation. There is hint of resentment here, as it often is between children and parents. After all this is the father who had taught him driving, about whom he had told Shutu a few scenes back that he should be glad he is not the one teaching him. Baba is not one to give way easily though, and a short exchange of shifting power dynamics happens between them. “Am I the father or you”, he asks him. He is right. The tragedy of masculinity and the way it perpetuates itself is that they are both doomed to be the same. What is about Shutu is actually also about all of them.

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