Janhvi Kapoor has done something that takes most Bollywood actors years to achieve – she got two back-to-back films with two of the biggest superstars of Telugu cinema. first junior ntr brother-in-law. Then Ram Charan inside pedi.

Projects are as big as they get. The co-stars are equally powerful. The platform is impossible to ignore. And yet, across two films, the question that haunts them from one release to the next remains unanswered: When does the performance arrive?

There is a special kind of disappointment for actors who have opportunities but keep choosing roles that merely make them attractive. And that’s a criticism that applies to Janhvi’s work in both brother-in-law And pedi.

Devara: A debut that hardly left a mark

When Janhvi made her Telugu debut brother-in-law The goodwill with Jr NTR was important. As the daughter of the late Sridevi – a legend in Telugu cinema with an unparalleled fan base – there was a ready emotional investment in her success.

His character Thangam had strictly limited scenes and one song. The writing didn’t help – the role was written from the beginning. But even within those limitations, there was little evidence of an artist trying to make something out of the cracks left open in the script. His character was so insignificant that even if he was removed, it would not have any impact on the film. To the relief of the audience, she also disappears from the film after some time. A glance, a silence, a moment of stillness that might suggest interiority – none of this is there.

In one film, the decision was inconvenient but forgivable. Maybe it was the limited screen time. Perhaps pedi Will be different. It’s not just this.

pedi:reduced to camera angle

If brother-in-law It was just a sample, pedi Taking it to another level – normalizing objectification, harassment and lack of consent, an actor of Ram Charan’s stature justified the most problematic gestures through his dialogues and gestures. Janhvi Kapoor is playing the character of Achiamma, the daughter of a local politician. pedi. Her first scene shows her taking off half her saree stole And was using it to set fire to her crops to gain sympathy for her father’s election campaign.

In one of his early scenes, Ram Charan’s Peddi breaks into Achiamma’s house. When the power goes out, he pulls her close and kisses her – never bothering to look at her face. Therefore, when he wants to recognize her after sunrise, he says: “I can recognize her by her figure. Her waist is so slim that she can almost fit in one hand.”

In another scene, he and his partner exchange one problematic line after another. “Is she talking or showing?”, “I will touch her at once because neither she nor her father will let me marry her.”

Peddie then begins to compliment her – describing her eyes, while the camera remains down her neck, never looking up. He describes her nose and the camera pans down to her navel. So much for a woman’s dignity.

Later, when Achiamma miraculously falls in love with Peddi – a development the film never bothers to show – she discovers that his mysterious kisser at midnight was the same one. She is shaken and asks: “Don’t you know it’s wrong to kiss a woman without her consent?” For a moment, it looks like the character might get a scene to redeem himself.

But director Buchi Babu Sana has made it worse. She justified the kiss by telling Paddy that some people offer flowers to express love – he only knows how to express it through touch. Consent be damned! He made it more complicated by saying that he would marry her. And Achiamma melted.

Now, Achiamma is not an incompetent character. She headlines her father’s local election campaign. At a public meeting, a man from the opposing faction cut the string of her skirt to publicly embarrass her. Peddi swoops in to save him and beats up those responsible. Proper textbook protector!

But here’s the contradiction the film never confronts: if cutting the string of her skirt is harassment, then kissing her without consent is also harassment. The film presents one as crime and the other as romance – and never stops to notice the difference.

Although the intention behind these poorly conceived scenes is beyond comprehension, the camera work makes it more complicated. It hardly focuses on Jhanvi’s face. Her character is present from the neck down – and that appears to be entirely by design. All this is a topic for discussion the next day (soon), but why is Janhvi becoming the mascot of objectification of women in films?

Both Ram Charan and Janhvi Kapoor, given the kind of commanding stature they enjoy in the industry, are expected to express their discomfort in scenes that are entirely built around a woman’s body rather than her character. What’s stopping them from asking writers to write better, directors to think better and to choose better themselves?

Let’s take a look at Janhvi’s last two releases: Tulsi Kumari of Sunny Sanskari And most beautiful. Both the films could not perform well at the box office. But the bigger problem was how lightly designed his characters seemed in these stories. At least one song in both the films focused solely on establishing Janhvi’s glamorous presence.

Which brings us to the big question. Is this Janhvi Kapoor’s problem, or is it the industry’s problem that she has stopped protesting?

Because till now enough evidence has been received that Jhanvi is not incapable of giving performance. movies like Gunjan Saxena, Millie and even some excerpts ruckus Showed a glimpse of honesty and effort. One can debate the results, but the intent to act was clear. The actor seems to be more interested in living a character than merely decorating a frame.

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This is what makes recent choices so intriguing.

Why does an actress who repeatedly talks about wanting challenging roles end up in films where her primary contribution is glamour? Why are some of the biggest commercial filmmakers in the country looking at him and seeing only a song, a waist shot and a romantic subplot? More importantly, why does she keep saying yes again and again?

The worry is not that Janhvi Kapoor is coming into commercial cinema. Some of the finest women of Indian cinema have flourished as mainstream entertainers. The difference is that he demanded characters. Sridevi could stop a film in its tracks with one comic scene. Soundarya could hold her own against the biggest stars. Even contemporary actors like Alia Bhatt, Sai Pallavi, Nayanthara and Samantha have, with varying degrees of success, insisted on playing women who are beyond the hero’s eyes.

With Jhanvi this trend seems to be moving in the opposite direction.

In film after film, the industry is becoming comfortable reducing him to a visual accessory. A glamorous presence, a marketing asset, a beautiful interruption between plot points. And every time she accepts such a role without publicly challenging its boundaries, the stereotype becomes stronger.

At some point, the conversation will have to move beyond box office numbers and star pairings. It’s an opportunity to do a film with Jr NTR. Doing a film with Ram Charan is an opportunity. But the occasion only matters if they deliver a performance that people remember.

Years from now, audiences are unlikely to remember how many superstar vehicles Janhvi Kapoor drove in. They will remember the characters he created, the scenes he owned and the moments that highlighted an actor worth watching.

This question is looming over his career today. Not whether he has access to big films or not. She clearly does. The question is whether he’s willing to demand more from those films and from himself.

pediMeanwhile, is currently playing in theatres.