The Accidental Prime Minister Review: A Movie that offers what you think

The Accidental Prime Minister is adapted from the book The Accidental Prime Minister: Making and Unmaking of Manmohan Singh. The book was published back on 20 April 2015 and is written by Sanjaya Baru, the policy analyst. The book was published by Penguin India and had garnered enough opposition for its portrayal of the then Prime Minister. This year, the book was adapted for the movie and no wonder it portrays the same image that we have had for so many years. The film showed the subservient image of Singh towards Sonia Gandhi and was a lot of controversial back them.

The Accidental Prime Minister Cast

The cast of the movie always happens to be the most interesting part apart from the story. Same happens with this. Anupam Kher, Vipin Sharma, Suzanne Bernet, Aahana Kumra, Akshaye Khanna, Arjun Mathur, and Munish Bhardwaj has some serious roles to play in the movie.

The Accidental Prime Minister Review

The movie completely tries to make our notion corrects. Instead of making the central character a rigid and strong character, the makers have turned him into a figure of pity. The Prime Minister played by Anupam Kher is shown as a rather weak person who was entirely under the control of the Gandhi family (Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi). The movie evokes nothing but a sense of pity towards the Prime Minister. And obviously, that isn’t something that we should owe towards such a powerful figure.

The film portrays our Prime Minister as a timid figure who was correct in terms of his principles and never took corruption as an option. However, it does bring in one fault of Singh that he overlooked the corruption of his colleagues because of the influence of Gandhi family.

The movie begins with showing all the necessary monuments such as Hawa Mahal, Taj Mahal, Qutub Minar and their relation with Singh. The movie is very much like that of the book, signifying the story of one man from the perspective of others. The film lacks the aesthetic charm of art and craft that it should be having. Sanjaya Baru, defending his book said, “Singh has become an object of ridicule, not admiration. I am showing him as a human being; I want there to be empathy for him.” The movie does evoke a sense of pity for him, but again, such a feeling for such a powerful figure isn’t required.

The Accidental Prime Minister Story

What really is odd about the film is the intervention of Baru in every aspect. We see him as a man who’s always there for Singh. Undoubtedly, he is one of those charming personalities who excels in everything. He has that right attitude of a suave with a cigarette in hand helping Singh through his rough times. He also helps him to get over the “flicking lists” of Sonia. Nonetheless, the film in no way grants the respect to Singh which he deserves.

Kher was phenomenal in playing the Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh. But, it is quite evident how he tried mimicking Singh’s voice, a way of walking and all. Apart from that, when the teaser of the movie dropped, the audience was quite excited about it. Basically, most of it was because the resemblance of the onscreen characters with those of the real lives one. As a memoir of Baru, the film was supposed to be the one that tells the story of a character.

The movies usually have two things to do- either to evoke a feeling or to tell a story. What The Accidental Prime Minister was supposed to do was to portray the real-life story of the Prime Minister. What it does is evokes a feeling of pity and sympathy towards the Prime Minister.

It has only brought down the character to that of a mockery. It is not only the central character but others as well such as Sonia Gandhi, and Rahul Gandhi are portrayed the same. It only confirms the bias towards the party that the audience already has. Sonia is portrayed as the controlling leader, Rahul Gandhi is portrayed as an ignorant leader, and Singh is the timid, hesitant ‘puppet.’

There is no role for audience participation in the movie. By this, it is meant that everything is served right in front of our eyes and aren’t giving any chance to come up with our own judgements. The film is what the makers want us to see and believe and not something that the audience must analyse.

The political elections being around the corner, the release of such a film may be intentional. How we judge Singh is our own intellect, but the film is surely one that does not portray what it should.