A hero defending a woman he has spent the entire runtime sexually harassing
In the landscape of Indian popular cinema, Peddi arrives as a cautionary tale about the distance between intention and execution — a sports redemption story that genuinely wishes to speak about dignity, caste, and social mobility, yet consistently betrays those aspirations through the very images it chooses to put on screen. Ram Charan's latest film, released amid the ongoing conversation about representation in pan-India cinema, reminds us that a meaningful premise is not the same as a meaningful film. The gap between what a story claims to value and how it actually treats its characters is, in the end, the truest measure of its moral seriousness.
- A film that opens with Olympic statistics and the promise of a common man's triumph quickly reveals itself to be more interested in spectacle than substance, burying its own best idea under genre confusion and borrowed plot points.
- Janhvi Kapoor's character is relentlessly framed as an object of desire rather than a person, with the camera and the hero alike treating her body as the story's real prize — a tension that grows more uncomfortable with each scene.
- The film's central contradiction becomes impossible to ignore when it presents a hero defending a woman's dignity in the same breath that it celebrates his persistent, uninvited fixation on her throughout the runtime.
- A second half that borrows from The Karate Kid and gestures toward caste discrimination offers a glimpse of the film Peddi could have been, but arrives too late to undo the damage of what preceded it.
- Boman Irani's grounded performance and the climactic speech about respect and resurrection hint at a version of this story — a proper masala film with genuine conviction — that was never fully realized.
Ram Charan's Peddi arrives with a premise worth taking seriously: a man of extraordinary, almost mythological physical ability — cricketer, runner, wrestler, laborer — becomes a vehicle for exploring sports as a path out of social marginalization. Boman Irani's character discovers this figure and the stage seems set for something meaningful. Instead, the film opens with exhausting credits, dubbing that sounds misaligned, and visual effects that strain belief, signaling early that the execution will not honor the concept.
The film's deeper failure emerges with Janhvi Kapoor's introduction. Her character exists almost entirely as an object of the hero's desire, her body framed by the camera in ways that serve neither story nor character. Peddi — positioned as a messiah figure for his community — spends much of the film in crude, persistent pursuit of her, identifying her by her waist, kissing her in the dark, assigning her a pet name that implies possession. A song celebrates this fixation. The contradiction is stark: a film that wants to speak about dignity treats its female lead as a trophy.
The most uncomfortable scene of the film arrives when men publicly humiliate Janhvi's character before an election, and Peddi responds with violence the film frames as heroic. But there is no heroism legible in that moment — only the same possessiveness dressed in different clothes. Divyenndu, capable of real depth, appears to have been swept along by the scale of a pan-India project without anchoring himself in the material.
The second half improves, borrowing from The Karate Kid and finally engaging with caste discrimination and the redemptive power of sport. Peddi's climactic speech carries genuine weight — the weight that should have held the entire film together. Boman Irani, throughout, is the one performer who seems to know he is in a real story.
What remains is a film that cannot decide whether it wants to be Chandu Champion, Dangal, or something else entirely, and so becomes none of them. The central irony is pointed: a story about dignity that has no idea how to practice it. Malayalam cinema is currently producing work with genuine progressive vision; Peddi, by contrast, mistakes its own contradictions for charm.
Ram Charan's latest vehicle, Peddi, arrives with an interesting premise buried so deep under narrative confusion and questionable creative choices that you have to wonder if anyone involved actually read the final script. The film opens with an exhausting sequence of credits while establishing that India won only two Olympic medals in 2016, a fact that troubles the character Tinnu Anand. When Boman Irani learns of Peddi—a man who is simultaneously a cricketer, a runner, a wrestler, and a laborer—the stage seems set for something meaningful. Ram Charan's character can apparently do anything, introduced with an English song that contradicts the film's stated interest in telling a story about the common man. There's a kernel of something real here, buried beneath dubbing that sounds off and visual effects that strain credibility.
But the film's real problems emerge the moment Janhvi Kapoor appears on screen. She is rendered almost entirely as an object of desire, her body constantly framed in ways that have nothing to do with character or story. In one scene she channels Sridevi's Roop Ki Rani Choron Ka Raja, but the camera lingers on her midriff rather than allowing any comic timing to breathe. Peddi, supposedly a messiah figure for his people, spends much of the film lusting after her with a crudeness that the script seems to think is charming. He claims he can identify her by her waist. He kisses her in the dark. He calls her "Chikri," a term suggesting wifehood. A song exists to celebrate this fixation. The contradiction is stark and damning: here is a film that wants to be about dignity and social mobility, yet it treats its female lead as a prize to be won through proximity and persistence.
There is a scene—one of the most uncomfortable of the year—where a group of men publicly undress Janhvi's character to humiliate her and her father before an election. Peddi beats them senseless. The film frames this as heroic. But there is no heroism in a man defending a woman he has spent the entire runtime sexually harassing. Divyenndu, an actor capable of genuine depth, seems to have gotten swept up in the idea of a pan-India project and lost sight of what he was actually doing. The second half improves somewhat, borrowing liberally from The Karate Kid, but by then the damage is done.
Boman Irani is the only performer who seems to understand he is in a real story. His character listens to a flashback that takes him across mountains and lakes, finally arriving exhausted at a tea stall. The humor here feels unintentional, or perhaps just poorly timed. The film does eventually touch on caste discrimination and how sports becomes a tool for resurrection and respect. Peddi's climactic speech carries the weight that should have anchored the entire narrative. There is a version of this story—a proper masala film that throws out all the empty, embarrassing moments—that could have worked. Instead, what we have is a mishmash of genres, a Pushpa-fication of the plot, and a Shruti Haasan item number that exists purely for crowd-pleasing catcalls.
The central irony is this: while Malayalam cinema is producing stories with genuine progressive vision, Peddi flaunts its immaturity and its problems as though they were virtues. Ram Charan's character can do everything except treat a woman with basic respect. The film cannot decide if it wants to be Chandu Champion, Dangal, or The Karate Kid, so it becomes none of them. An interesting idea about sports and social mobility gets lost in a palimpsest of borrowed moments and borrowed morality. What remains is a film that knows what it wants to say about dignity but has no idea how to say it without undermining itself at every turn.
Citas Notables
Peddi, the man who is a supposed messiah of his people, nonchalantly lusts for the heroine— Firstpost review
On one hand, when Malayalam cinema is telling progressive stories that have the power to stand the test of time, a film like this flaunts its puerile and problematic telling like second skin— Firstpost review
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does a film about a working-class athlete need to spend so much time sexualizing its female lead?
It doesn't. That's the whole problem. The film wants to tell a story about respect and social mobility, but it can't resist treating Janhvi Kapoor as a body first and a character second. The contradiction is so stark it becomes the real story.
Is there anything salvageable in the concept itself?
Yes. The idea of sports as a path out of caste discrimination is genuinely powerful. Boman Irani's character and the climactic speech hint at what this could have been. But the execution is so muddled—too many genres, too many songs, too much borrowed DNA from other films—that the core gets lost.
What does it say about the industry that this film got made this way?
It suggests that someone thought they could have it both ways: a progressive message about dignity wrapped in regressive treatment of women. As though the politics of the story could survive the politics of how it's told. They can't.
Does Ram Charan's performance work at all?
He's fine as a physical presence. The problem isn't his acting. It's that his character is written to be a hero while behaving like someone who hasn't learned basic respect. That's a script problem, not an actor problem.
You mentioned The Karate Kid. Does the second half actually improve?
Marginally. Once the film stops trying to be a romance and focuses on the athletic redemption arc, there's more coherence. But by then you've already sat through so much that doesn't work that it's hard to care.