“Toxic” cannot be viewed like you would a normal mainstream movie. So, it’s important, first, to reflect on the perspective through which Geetu Mohandas is telling this story — which character’s perspective, to be precise — instead of completely dismissing it just because it doesn’t look like a… normal movie. When a filmmaker comes up with a hitherto unseen method of dabbling in a familiar genre with all the associated themes and tropes, some time needs to be allocated for this purpose, and I think it deserves it. I’ll keep this spoiler-free, as always.
There’s a reason why Yash’s new film looks and sounds the way it does. Of course, I don’t know for sure what reason Yash and Geetu, who co-wrote the script, had for shaping the film the way it is now. I don’t know if it was initially of a different structure or whether any restructuring happened later. All I can say is what I felt about it. I cannot speak for the general audience. (After all, film critics are supposed to be representatives of their own views only, not someone else’s. Of course, we can make an observation on what others might think about a movie, especially something that’s bound to generate an intense debate, but in the end, it’s about what ONE PERSON felt.)
So, let me get this out of the way first: “Toxic” is not “KGF”. If Yash’s two-part Kannada blockbuster was a glorified hero worship extravaganza — the kind that exists for the sole purpose of escapism and escapism only — “Toxic” exists to deconstruct the myth, the image of the invincible gangster. That thing about perspective I mentioned earlier? This one is narrated through a certain character, and everything that follows, especially in the third act, begins to make sense when you remember that we happen to be in the head of someone totally messed up. So, anything that comes from that head is bound to look like a disjointed, totally chaotic and unpredictable fever dream. That doesn’t mean it’s a vision that a lot of people, myself included, would wholeheartedly enjoy.
Look, I get that this isn’t a typical commercial entertainer, but when you’re making a movie with a duration of over three hours, and try to sell it as though you’re going to have a GREAT time with it, isn’t it the responsibility of the filmmakers to make it at least… entertaining? After all, people go to the cinema to be entertained, right? I mean, it’s not like people didn’t know what they were walking into — the trailers had already made it quite clear that “Toxic” is supposed to be something wild and unhinged. It is, indeed, a huge gamble to do something experimental on a giant budget, with an actor who had just delivered two back-to-back blockbusters.
Again, this is my assumption, but “Toxic” feels like an answer to the critics who aren’t fans of the “KGF” films, the ones who found it problematic. If that’s the case, fine. There are great examples of gangster movies — classics, that is — where the protagonist, a crime figure, isn’t shown as somebody to get inspired by. Brian De Palma’s “Scarface” is a perfect example. So are “The Godfather” films. Geetu’s intention with her film is the same, but her approach is, to put it simply, not quite… palatable. In fact, if anyone doesn’t get a migraine by the end of it, I’d be surprised. (I happened to see it with a group of loud, ruckus-creating rowdies who made the entire experience a nearly four-hour-long endurance test.)
A lot of events happen in “Toxic” that establish the fact that there is no character worth rooting for. And that’s fine. But when every major character is delivering their lines in the same detached tone, as though they think whatever they’re saying is poetic, made even worse by the atrocious dubbing (mine was the Hindi version), heightened melodrama with a lot of yelling and crying, not to mention multiple mentions of “Daddy”, it’s not really easy to sit through. Perhaps the idea was to evoke the manner in which a psychologically tormented character remembers images from their past — fragmented, disjointed… with Ravi Basrur’s utterly unremarkable, earsplitting and headsplitting music. It makes sense why the film stays with Yash’s Raya (the central figure) longer than the other characters, including the female characters. Oh, and don’t go in expecting sex scenes that pander to the male gaze.
Kiara Advani and Nayanthara put on a solid show as characters supremely integral to Raya’s journey. Their characters make a considerable impact, but not their performances. In Nayanthara’s case, her character Ganga shares a deeply traumatic backstory with her brother Raya. The film manages to generate sparks of emotion when it explores their backstory and the bearing it has on the rest of the events, but becomes feeble when the focus is diverted to other characters. Huma Qureshi’s character, Elizabeth, is a member of the rival family and tries to make the best out of whatever is given. As for the characters of Rukmini Vasanth and Tara Sutaria, there’s nothing worth talking about, because they merely function to take the plot forward. Zero meaningful contribution. Blame the writing; not the women.
This is a visually grandiose film with densely populated frames. But here’s the problem: What’s the point of filling the sets with all those era-appropriate details when the scenes move with the same speed of a badly edited Instagram reel? I remember looking at one impressive nighttime scene where Yash is enveloped by a green-like haze while he dispatches his opponents with a Thompson machine gun, and that shot lasted barely a couple of seconds. Since veteran Rajeev Ravi, who shot Anurag Kashyap’s “Gangs of Wasseypur” and “Bombay Velvet”, is behind the camera, it would only be a shock if “Toxic” didn’t look stunning.
That said, the obvious CGI-enhanced scenes stick out like a sore thumb and become jarring on more than one occasion. The haphazardly edited action sequences in a few places don’t help either. That’s not to say “Toxic” doesn’t have any good action sequences at all. In fact, some are exceptional, like the unabashedly gory fights that are shot with the same glee that anything in “The Raid” or “The Night Comes For Us” was done, or anything involving the father and son gave me a brief adrenaline high.
The most watchable bit in “Toxic” comes at the very end, when Yash shows up as the beardless son ‘Ticket’. This is where the film is liberated from the constantly tiresome need to act like everyone is inside a music video/commercial and take some time to focus on one thing instead of several. Perhaps this has to do with the “clarity” that one character achieves after a certain point. I would even go so far as to say that Ticket prevents this film from becoming a complete waste of time. I got a big kick out of what Geetu and Yash did with this character — and I’m not just talking about his crazy theatrics or looks, but an interesting twist that makes you look at everything that came before in a new light, including the odd editing choices of some crucial plot developments that happened in the past.
“Toxic” deserves kudos for ambition and daring, but that doesn’t necessarily translate to a pleasant experience. Of course, you cannot expect a story about unpleasant characters to be comfortable, and there’s no doubt about Yash delivering a fully committed performance, but his character also creates a fair amount of confusion after the film goes into soul-searching mode. As I said, this is not a normal movie, in ways both good and bad.
Film: Toxic: A Fairytale for Grown-Ups
Director: Geetu Mohandas
Cast: Yash, Nayanthara, Kiara Advani, Tara Sutaria, Huma Qureshi, Rukmini Vasanth
Rating: 2/5
