Review of Raazi (2018) by Emily B — 15 Nov 2018

Raazi is a 2018 Bollywood film based off of Harinder S. Sikka's book Calling Sehmat. The true story of a young Indian woman, Sehmat, marrying a Pakistani soldier in order to spy on his father is an intense thriller which portrays a previously untold side of the Indo-Pakistani wars. Unlike many other Bollywood films, Raazi is starkly realistic. Instead of painting an idealistic world centered on love, the film tells the realistic story of war, with love barely having a place. The film portrays the destruction of the Bollywood moral universe as Sehmat goes from an empathetic student to having to murder for her job as a spy.

Contrastingly to Veer-Zaara, which tells the story of an Indian and Pakistani falling in love in the bright Punjab countryside with the underlying political message that Pakistan and India should move beyond past tensions, Raazi has no happy ending and focuses more on Sehmat's journey as a spy than her romance with Iqbal. Similar to the both Zaara and Saamiya in Veer-Zaara, however, Sehmat proves to be an incredible feminist, especially by fearfully fulfilling the traditionally male role as a spy to fight for her country. But just as Daiya argues that Zaara's character is both a modern feminist and simultaneously still "performatively reproduces hegemonic relations of gendered patriarchal power", Sehmat falls into a similar characterization. While her character rejects many gendered stereotypes, she still leaves college to become a spy because her father asked her to then after her father dies her life is controlled by her male mentor.

Raazi is a must see film because it tells the true story of a young Indian woman's contribution to the war. For a long time her contribution went unacknowledged, just as so many other women's contributions were. It also manipulates typical Bollywood themes to truly show the pervasiveness of war. By the end of the film the moral universe is no longer rectifiable.