The White Tiger (2020, R)

Just one Oscar nomination for this film, Best Adapted Screenplay, but I’m glad that got it on my radar because I enjoyed it quite a bit. This dark rags-to-riches tale features strong performances and a gripping story.

Self-made entrepreneur Balram reaches out to the visting premier of China, eager to offer himself up as proof of India’s potential as a capitalist powerhouse. As an object lesson, he tells his own story of leaving the poverty of his village to become a servant for the son of a wealthy slumlord, where he sees how the other half lives and endeavors to figure out how he can get his own taste of it.

I’m not familiar with the book on which it’s based, but this movie drew me in pretty quickly. The roots of Balram’s story are so timeless, that of a smart young boy whose poverty threatens to shut him out of any opportunity to realize his great potential. Early in the film, he lays out the “rooster coop” of India’s lower castes, whereby all servants learn to accept inevitable abuse, exploitation, and humiliation from their masters. But Balram is an enterprising young man brimming with self-determination, and he refuses to accept the lot that his village, his caste, and the universe has assigned him. Once he secures his job as a driver for the wealthy young Ashok and his Indian American wife Pinky, Balram quickly learns when to flatter and coddle, when to scrape and bow, and when to sweat and toil in order to get ahead.

The film does a great job showing the uncertainty of Balram’s situation at all times, and even when he’s at his most “comfortable,” that still means sleeping on a thin mattress on the floor and being hit whenever his master is in an impatient mood. Even as he’s making more money than he’s ever had in his life, he’s acutely aware that his is a servile existence, and he’s even more aware of the indulgences lavished on his master’s family which are utterly inaccessible to him. It’s a compelling pressure-cooker of a situation, and it’s easy to see why Balram isn’t content to stay in his place.

I’m not familiar with Adarsh Gourav, but he’s very good as Balram, at once entirely convincing in whatever performance he’s giving to his masters while also plainly showing the angrier, more envious thoughts that are stirring beneath the surface. I also enjoy Rajkummar Rao and Priyanka Chopra Jones as Ashok and Pinky. Both characters have spent a lot of time in the U.S. and have more western ideas about servanthood, so their interactions with Balram are very different than how Ashok’s father treats him, but those “progressive” attitudes still only extend so far.

Warnings

Violence, language, sexual content, drinking/smoking, and strong thematic elements.