On Newton- Digging Beneath the Dark Comedy

It is not so common for a well made film to get both an enthusiastic popular response and critical acclaim. Newton seems to have achieved this with relative ease, while bagging the title of being India's official entry to the Oscars along the way. It is a dark comedy that traces the efforts of an honest and idealistic government officer called Newton, to conduct fair elections in the jungles of tribal and Naxal-affected Chattisgarh. Sure, there are many dark comedies, but not many can generate humor and evoke a deep sense of unease at the same time when security personnel are advising a man looking to make a quick buck to surrender as a Naxalite. Newton is one such film. 

In the opening scenes of the film, Newton rejects a marriage proposal by his parents to an underage girl. What could be a casual scene in a film like this, is a fitting introduction to the protagonist, who quickly proves his mettle as an idealist with impeccable, often textbookish morals. He is the sort of man who will not take a lunch break 5 minutes before the scheduled time. When given the task of setting up  a polling booth in the forest, he dutifully takes it up and presides over it in a run-down schoolroom, without fearing the threat of the Naxals, which looms not only over the jungles, but also over the entire film. 

                                                                              

For an area which is in the middle of a physical conflict, as well as an ideological one, Newton is the outsider who thinks nothing of either side. His neutrality and lack of preconceived notions about the Naxals could be a reflection of the writing-an outsider's perspective on the issue, but combined with his unwavering faith in democratic ideals, he becomes the perfect protagonist to take the audience on a trip of self-examination of what it means to live in a democracy like India. As Newton uncovers the issues facing the people of the region, so does the audience, but it takes some reflection to see this as a film which touches upon the myriad complexities of an issue, that is often painted with hues of unquestioning nationalism, with biting black humour.

Newton is accompanied by a troupe of people and CRPF forces on this task. Among them is a seasoned CRPF officer named Aatma Singh, who tries to dissuade him from going into the forest, a local school teacher named Malko, who is not new to the farce that is carried out under the name of elections in such places and two clerks, one of whom is a diabetic who writes zombie stories in his pastime. In one scene, he narrates that the very forest they are in is also where Laxman chopped of Shoorpankha's nose in the Ramayan. But little does he know that her tale rings very close home to the tribals who are shown their place in a similar manner by the state.

To depict the relationship of the different characters with the setting, the film often frames them in different ways. Malko, who is a member of the adivasi community, is positioned quite differently in many frames. Being a local and privy to the area, the villagers and their issues, she is framed inside the walls of the dilapidated polling room, while Newton and his clerks are shown to stand at the entrance looking inside in a wonderfully shot scene. In another, Malko is standing with Newton outside the polling room, describing a local chutney made from ants. As she casually remarks on his ignorance about the way of life of a people who stay only a few hours away from him, both of them are shot from the inside, giving the audience as well as Newton a peek into the local life of the adivasis. He sits at the very front of the room, but is hardly shot in full frame in the room, sometimes only half visible. However, as the film progresses, and things fail to go as per Newton's plans, he finds his faith in his dearly held ideals shattered, which is when he is shown at the very centre of the frame. The camera zooms out, and a man who earlier was the only person brimming with optimism in a crowd standing in reserve to be assigned election duty, suddenly feels very small and helpless in front of a system that is apathetic and unyielding. 

                  

Singh, who in this troupe is the state's handman and sent to do its often dirty work, has a more realistic view of how things work in such areas, and thinks that the election in the forest are a fool's errand. As someone whose job it is to keep the locals under control and always be suspicious of them, he is never shown entering the polling room (He is also forbidden to do so)-albeit in one scene where talks to Newton more as a friend than as a leader of a security force. Tied to his duty and his job, he is shown to be merely a cog in the wheel of the powers that be.             

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As it turns out, one never sees the Naxals themselves. In fact, what is promised to be one of the most dangerous places to conduct an election, turns out to be a forest like any other. When we are introduced to the film's main setting in the forest, it is deemed extremely unsafe by the authorities. Though the tone of the film is light, such is the build-up of the dangerous reputation of this area that the officer who is appointed to preside over the election booth shies away from the risky task. This raises the viewer’s anticipation of some sudden violence by the Naxals, maybe an abduction at the very least. But the only Naxalite presence in the film is their angry writing on the walls of the polling room. Indeed, the sole tension of the film comes from the CRPF, who have to manufacture some conflict at the end to give some outcome to the suspense that has been built up. Upon discovering this, Newton tries to flee the security forces, but he is caught after a chase. As Newton struggles and eventually gives in, the weight of the hands that pin him to the ground might as well be the weight of the system trying to keep him in his place. Such a treatment is fitting for a film, which appears to extol the power of Indian democracy, but slowly peels it of its sheen instead, and lays bare the lies and the rot within.

On its surface, Newton appears to be about an honest government officer's efforts to conduct a fair election in Naxalite Chattisgarh, but a lot more is going on underneath. A stray dialogue here, a seemingly irrelevant shot there reveal all that the film is truly about. The dilapidated school surrounded by houses razed to the ground, which is transformed into a makeshift voting booth, could have been the beacon of democracy’s triumph over insurgency and instability. But it is instead the symbol of coercion, where houses are burnt by those meant to protect, kids are interrogated and villagers are forced to vote for a system that neither represents them nor acknowledges their language, dignity and lives. 

When the first vote is cast after the Director Inspector General and foreign media enter the picture, it becomes obvious that this is no longer a question of fair elections, but that of preserving the honour of a meticulously cultivated identity. In a telling scene, Newton tries to tell the DIG about the problems he is facing in ensuring fair voting. The DIG asks him if there has been a booth capture or tampering of the voting machines, and in what he says is captured the entirety of the Indian imagination of what could go wrong in a democratic election, an imagination which never goes on to examine some of its very fundamental flaws.

India's official entry to the Oscars is a film that very subtly touches upon the many carefully concealed failures of the Indian state, in not only failing to bring democracy and justice to its most marginalized people, but also in recognizing their existence. In a scene that truly sums up the film, clueless villagers are rounded up like criminals by the CRPF to vote, while there is a sound of a hen being beheaded in the background. For the viewers, it might as well be the sound of the axe coming down on their rosy image of India's democracy.  

Source for the poster: By Drishyamfilmsindia - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57713399