The Indian movie WrestleMania! Daddy" film review

WrestleMania! "Daddy" tells the story of Mahavira (Amir Khan) who insists on training her daughter to become a wrestler to realize her dreams. After the film was released in China, it set a record for the highest box office of a non-Hollywood film and became the most popular Indian film in the Chinese market.

1. Characters and plot

WrestleMania! "Daddy" has three main characters: Dad and two daughters, and two minor characters: Mom and Nephew. The story revolves around the father and two daughters.

His father, Mahavira Singh Perga (Amir Khan), was a successful wrestler and a representative of male power in India. In the film, in order to realize his dreams when he was young, he disregards the world's eyes and overbears his two daughters to learn wrestling. However, in the film, the audience can see his authoritarian and unsympathetic side, but also see his tenderness, his deep love for his daughter. His love seemed subtle and stoic, and the one-year training period agreed with his wife was another manifestation of his father's love. Wrestling has allowed two daughters to break free from endless housework, free from the fate of marrying at the age of 14, free from the fate of most Indian women, and choose their own life destiny. At first, the daughters were trained only to be afraid of their fathers, and as the training time became longer and longer, the daughters also began to train for themselves and realize their dreams with their fathers.

Geeta (Fatima Sana Shaka) is Singh's eldest daughter who has won several wrestling competitions through her father's devilish training and is eligible for entry to the Pattiala National Academy of Sports for more professional training. The new coach trained in a very different way than his father, starting training at seven o'clock every day, so Geeta had a lot of free time, at the instigation of her friends, to start shopping, watch movies, eat high-calorie food, grow long hair, do a lot of things that had nothing to do with training, and distract a lot of time and energy. Once disagreed with their father over wrestling skills, they had a wrestling match, and the father lost to Geeta because of his old age and physical weakness. Geeta doesn't know that the father doesn't want to hold on to his position, his training skills, he just doesn't want to be denied by his own daughter. Geeta did think that her father was no longer able to take care of her, and that he could be alone. Since then, Geeta has been more sluggish in training, and can calmly apply nail polish when losing games, and Geeta's energy is not as fully engaged in the game as when she was a child. She will be lost, she will be sad, but she will not calm down and seriously reflect on herself. Finally, the repeated failures made Geeta feel pain, and with the encouragement of her sister Babita, Geeta finally called her father to admit her mistake. With the help and encouragement of her father, Geeta eventually won the world championship.

Babita (Sonya Mahota) is Geeta's younger sister. Babita grew up practicing wrestling with Geeta, getting up at five o'clock every day to train, cutting off her long hair, and lazily tuning her father's alarm clock to escape training. As an adult, Babita contrasts with her sister Geeta, who will always encourage Geeta, will play a regulatory role in Geeta and her father, will watch Geeta's game very seriously, constantly cheer for Geeta, and when Geeta wins the championship, she will rush up and hug her with excitement. With his constant efforts, Babita also entered the Patiara National Academy of Sports, underwent more comprehensive training, and won a silver medal in the world competition.

The mother in the film (Sakashi Tewa) is a traditional Indian female figure. She was originally a vegetarian and wanted her family to be stable and happy, so she took her husband's dream as the first, and she must have a son for him and realize his dream. What is not satisfactory is that these four children are all daughters. She could not resist her husband's will, and when he was going to train her daughter to become a wrestler, she could only make a one-year pact with him. In the Hindu conception, people cannot eat meat, but the husband Singer insisted on supplementing her daughter, and she expressed strong dissatisfaction and resolutely did not allow her husband to make chicken in his kitchen, but still gave the pot to her husband. When the husband gave her daughters chicken, she was both frightened and worried, because it broke her strong religious precepts. Her compromises and concessions again and again reflect the subordinate position of Indian women in the family.

The nephew is the first narrative perspective of the film, and he constantly promotes the development of the plot, avoids the subjectivity of the protagonist's narrative, and enhances the objectivity and authenticity of the story. The character setting of the funny character of nephew adds a lot of comedic elements to the film, neutralizing Singh's serious image. The nephew accompanied the two daughters to training, which seemed to be a sparring role, but actually implied that sons should not be preferred.

2. Music and editing

1. Music

Music is an important element in rendering the development of the film's plot, and like most Indian films, WrestleMania! The music of "Daddy" also plays an important role. Every time the music appears in the film, it is just right to promote the development of the plot and render the theme. For example, when Geeta and Babita start training, background music appears, the melody is cheerful, the atmosphere is increased, the use of fast cutting methods, the tension of the picture is increased, and the lyrics are full of irony, criticizing the patriarchalism of the father: to fulfill your dreams / Why torture us so much / Cut our hair / How can we lift our heads / Is he an exploiter / Why do you treat your daughter this way / We are still children / Should not be robbed of childhood. And when the father leads the two children to the competition, the background music portrays the characters of the two daughters from another angle. The cheerful tunes add to the film's light-comedy vibe, giving effective narrative elements: shorts and t-shirts, like a whirlwind blowing through/where it passes, sweeping through a thousand armies/She's an invincible supergirl/Hey, boy, your pride will be burned/She's manipulating the fire of destruction/She'll define your value/There won't be the slightest mistake/ and then throw you out. When Geeta won the competition and the Indian national anthem sounded, the picture suddenly turned to the father, and the picture composition of the close-up characters made us see the father's tears very clearly. Geeta not only fulfilled her father's dreams for many years, but also realized her beliefs that she had held on to for many years, setting an example for all Indian women and attacking male power.

2. Clip

WrestleMania! "Daddy" uses a linear narrative to tell the story of the father and the two daughters, and in the editing, it uses parallel editing, cross-editing and other techniques to strengthen the narrative effect of the film. For example, after Geeta had a conflict with his father, Babita competed in the national competition and won the championship under the guidance of his father's technical guidance; And Geeta participated in the international competition, under the guidance of the coach, gradually lost. Here the director adopts the method of parallel editing, presenting the two matches in turn, enhancing the dramatic conflict and deepening the contradiction between the father's wrestling technique and the coach's wrestling technique.

At the end of the film, Geeta's tense competition environment contrasts with the quiet atmosphere of his father's confinement, and the film also uses cross-editing techniques to bring the audience the greatest sense of substitution, so that the audience is once again deeply touched by the film.

In addition, the film does not use a lot of dazzling editing techniques, but in the details processing, the film's editing is meticulous and in place, making the film's emotions very full of emotions and emotional rendering very good.

III. Conclusion

WrestleMania! "Daddy" is a light comedy style film, although the theme is traditional, but it reflects a lot of real problems, including feminist issues, education issues and so on. In the film, Geeta's friend is married at the age of 14, and she is a victim of the play and a true portrayal of countless Indian women. She ended her sad and helpless life, whipping the Geeta sisters towards the mud and wrestling. The Geeta sisters were deeply touched, and they didn't want to marry at a young age and live an ordinary life of pots and pans. They have choices in the face of life. Although it was their father who forced themselves to train, after recognizing the reality, they began to realize that this was the only way to change their destiny, so they took the initiative to get up and train, turning passive into active. This can be said to be the awakening of their female consciousness.

The successes of Geeta and Babita have been a powerful attack on the traditional practice of patriarchal supremacy. At the end of the film, Geeta finally wins the competition and wins the gold medal. The gold medal here is no longer a gold medal in the traditional sense, but a symbol of honor for Indian women. Geeta handed the gold medal to her father, who finally said something that had made us wait for a long, long time: I'm proud of you. Here, the film completes the sublimation of the theme, that is, as long as women are given the opportunity, they will make history.