Sardar Udham (2021)

It is interesting to watch this film now, in a week where a British MP has been brutally stabbed to death doing his job, and to maybe ask ourselves a question. What has the killing of a man ever actually achieved? It never makes anything any better. It serves to galvanise both sides and retrench enmities and bitterness that can take many years to wain. This film depicts one such story. That of a man who also passionately believed it was acceptable to take a life. His motives appear demonstrably justifiable as we watch this beautifully shot, frequently harrowing, depiction of the lead up to the atrocity of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in 1919. It is told through the eyes of the assassin - Udham Singh (Vicky Kaushal) and over the course of the next two hours, we are exposed to the events that drove a decent man to commit the ultimate sin, and to pay the ultimate penalty. Whilst it does take a little while to get going, Shoojit Sircar develops a story replete with conflicting emotions, that offers a critique on the prevailing imperial attitudes and on the very value of life itself. It clearly, and succinctly, exemplifies the cruelty visited on people who just wanted to be left to govern themselves; and of the shockingly arrogant superiority complex of those who believed these people to be little more capable of such aspirations than pets, or sheep. The film looks stunning - the imagery of India from grand scale to violent aftermath; the settings in London - all add hugely to the gutsy integrity of this story. As with so much about the man himself, much is still be be made public about these events and about the true intent of the vice-regal, or British, governments in making an example of these unarmed protesters - but this surmising offers an entirely plausible assessment of man's inhumanity to man - and sadly, over 100 years on from this - we appear to have learned little about the merits of killing another human being - friend or foe.