Stree 2 has grossed around Rs. 200 crore worldwide in just three days of release. Both the audiences and critics seem to enjoy this ‘Worthy Sequel.’ A new trouble for the residents of Chanderi town lies in the wrath of the Headless monster, ‘Sarkate Ka Aatank.’ Directed by Amar Kaushik and written by Niren Bhatt this horror comedy genre has again been revived with a pinch of rip-roaringly funny comic gigs. Stree 2 revolves around a group of friends, led by Rajkummar Rao’s Vicky, a tailor, who falls in love with a mysteriously nameless woman character played by Shraddha Kapoor.
The villain, Sarkata terrorise the town of Chanderi after the town overcomes the terror of Stree. Shraddha, the girl with no name, who Vicky is charmed by vanished into thin air at the end of the original. She is back again now with a deeper personal motive to fight Sarkata. Sarkata, a somewhat Indian version of Terminator, has been mysteriously abducting women of Chanderi.
The film also stars Abhishek Banerjee, Pankaj Tripathi and Aparshakti Khurana in key roles, making it the same cast for most key roles. Once again, Vicky and his friends are supposed to save the town of Chanderi. These men are very vulnerable, unsure and doubtful of their abilities. Ultimately, Shraddha’s character allies with these vulnerable men like in part 1 to fight Sarkata. Even her character who was very mysterious throughout the first film has a good character development with an enigmatically richer back story making it a more interesting character to explore and watch. As a result of Sarkata’s narrative, Stree’s previous feminist take on a woman returning for revenge in Chanderi has now been transformed into a headless monster who is a literal embodiment of the patriarchs in the society.
Social commentary with a good laugh
Niren Bhatt keeps the screenplay’s pace balanced. The first half is quite excellently crafted with non-stop humor coming your way. Something that the viewers expected from a Stree sequel. But even after narrative flaws and lots of unanswered questions at places, it’s the talented bunch of actors who make Stree 2 a worthy sequel and overall a good laugh with a feminist social commentary. The silly goofy Rajkumar Rao, the perfect comic relief progressions of Pankaj Tripathi, and Shraddha’s commendable performance are just a great all-in-one combo.
As film critic Sucharita rightfully points out the filmmakers are using a ‘spoonful of sugar to make the medicine go down,’ approach. They don’t want to smash patriarchy right away with a serious approach. Instead, in the film’s first half that sugar is in overdose. They first let the characters develop so that the audience empathises with them and their vulnerabilities even after many gaps. The fact that Sarkata is killing only the ‘progressive women,’ of Chanderi represents how patriarchs suppress women who stand their ground in this male-dominated world. The reason why the heroes in question are so fun to watch is that the writers have made them vulnerable, idiotic and funny with many flaws unlike the usual ‘sigma males,’ of Bollywood films.
Even though male characters have more screen time than Shraddha’s character who is the main protagonist, they haven’t been shown as the regular perfect Mr Rights. This makes it easier for the audience to relate with the characters especially Vicky and his friends. Then once this empathy for these characters develops they quite end it on an allyship note on how both men and women need to work together to smash the patriarchy.
Women in Stree 2 hold more agency. The empowerment of the women in Stree 2 lies in their own hands. Something that would be a rare case to explore especially in a horror comedy genre film in Bollywood. As the interval of the film approaches, important characters like Jana make a comeback and the sarkata gets in a good fight. With Tamanna Bhatia’s song appearance, the makers do compromise with the feminist approach somewhat to maybe not sound too serious in their narrative. They easily switch from powerful agency and narrative-holding female characters like that of Shraddha’s to that of Tamanna who makes an appearance only while flirting with Jana, Vicky and others and do not hold much relevance to the plot itself.
However, a clever approach to make social commentary while not wanting to sound too ‘serious and unfunny,’ for the audience is a job well done for the right kind of audience. Varun Dhawan also enters the narrative as a Bhediya in the film. There is another appearance of actor Akshay Kumar in the film who is possibly the mastermind behind the mishaps in Chanderi town, according to the story plot. He seems like the Thanos of the Chanderi world. The film uses many computer-generated graphics to balance the lack of genuine scares in the narrative.
