Pressure Cooker: Decadence is delicious, the price, shattering!

Amidst the escapism-based Eid movies aiming to take away the audience into a world of glamour and fantasy, there is one release that boldly goes against the tide -- Pressure Cooker!

Dark, grim, funny at times, piercing and, yes, arousing too, this is but a reflection of the sub layers of social ethos that most feel disturbed to discuss.

And therein lies the film’s main power -- it’s packaged as a movie but presented to us as a biting piece of what’s going out in the world.

Greed, deceit, rapacity, lust, perfidy form an uneasy undertone of vice, but, don’t lose hope, there’s always a dash of virtue.

A drop of righteousness in a sea of sin.

The film’s message is clear -- life gives you back the result of your actions!

The tale of four women, each from a different social background, yet their lives have a connection as their deeds lead to their karma.

An educated but abused wife of an unprincipled politician, the naïve beauty parlour masseuse desperate to win back her errant husband, the social media influencer who creates a fake online persona to gain followers and a gullible college girl idolising romance -- four women ruthlessly thrown into the murky urban whirlpool where the line between truth and lies become blurred, principles are diluted with self-interest, morals moulded to accommodate selfish desires, ethics sacrificed unceremoniously for instant gratification.

Decadence, as we like to call it!

Delicious, addictive, euphoric but transient!

Uncomfortable Truths We Ignore

Pressure Cooker is about harsh facts of life, blurring lines between the right and wrong.

A reflection of the ruthless world out there, it shows the victim of treachery lashing out against society to become a predator, the mask of gullibility flung away to embrace a life of pretense.

Deceived by the husband, a massage parlour worker aims to become the best masseuse in town, using her feminine wiles plus powers of seduction to give the customer the ending that will be leave him craving for more; the wife of a politician is slowly sucked into the murky world of politics where morals, murder and mayhem blend to form a strange but addictive culture, a social media influencer’s make belief life of adulation crumble as she faces the venal side of the police while the zing of romance for one turns into a struggle to survive in the face of acute hardship.

To many, this may sound like an art house flick but it’s not, there’s plenty of humour and comic relief.

However, unmistakably, reality always manages to come on top, reminding the audience that they are not just watching a movie but a cinematic representation of life.

The human who is forced into sin due to circumstances and the person who chooses vice by choice both face the sting of karma -- a conundrum thrown at the audience.

Depravity and Decadence Lead to a Dark End

In a capitalist, consumerist society, money is king while in its quest, many decide to trample on ethics and principles.

When you have enough cash, all problems can be tackled, goes the belief in modern day society.

True to an extent but there’s one thing money cannot buy and that is destiny, or the consequence of one’s actions.

Karma will come knocking when one least expects it; Pressure Cooker captures that with chilling inevitability.

As Shakespeare said in King Lear: time will unfold what plighted cunning hides, who covers faults, at last shame them derides!

One can look at Pressure Cooker as a movie reflecting society and then s/he can take this as a celluloid warning about the devastating end to lives that seek bling in sin.

Toned down camera work reduces the cinematic glamour effect, which deserves kudos.

As for acting, Nazifa Tushi and Shabnam Bubly both are brilliant.

Fazlur Rahman Babu plays the role of a crafty, avaricious police officer to perfection.

For a certain period, Babu’s character appears to be principled but soon, the façade falls off to reveal a depraved soul -- calculating, cruel and callous.

Such people are all around us, appearing helpful but exploiting our vulnerabilities with perverted pleasure.

Just jog your memory and I am sure there will be plenty of experiences which will find resonance with what you see in the movie.

One scene is etched in memory: Shahiduzzaman Selim, playing the role of a rent-a-car driver, smoking in the cold, his eyes frozen on Tushi, who is staring back at him, her gaze, hypnotic.

This film is an indictment of a society that has become mercenary, it’s a dissection of urban sleaze hidden under layers of razzle dazzle.

The only fault is that in showing the result of vice, some of the endings are brutal.

A Bit Too Savage!

Commenting on Pressure Cooker, Zahirul Islam, a journalist, said: “This is an unvarnished look at reality and how circumstances compel people to wade into a world of quick money and fast fame.”

This is also an acknowledgement of a pernicious urban culture that unabashedly commodifies women, he added.

We may not like it but it’s the truth, contends Mazharul Islam, a broadcast journalist.

Sometimes, humans make the mistakes which take them to their doom, he said, adding: “But then, perhaps it’s the stars that guide humans to commit the follies.”

Director Raihan Rafi has given us blockbuster commercial productions before, this time he gives us a slice of life, we tend to hush up.

Pressure Cooker will raise the blood pressure of a lot of pseudo moral advocates and irk traditionalists but will, in the future, be regarded as a masterpiece.

A cinematic tour de force, indeed!

While there are plenty of critical comments on Pressure Cooker, some calling it unsuitable for family viewing, the director may take comfort in a saying from the philosopher, late Humayun Azad: “My works that please the masses are for the present and those which annoy are for the future.”

[Towheed Feroze is a former journalist!]