Five films that explore juvenile crime and abuse

Film draw heavily from happenings in society

Lokesh Kanagaraj’s ‘Master’ is a film that deals with juvenile delinquency. The film begins with Bhavani (Vijay Sethupathi) as a teenager who experiences horrific trauma when his family gets murdered. He is forced to take the blame of the homicide and is put in a juvenile reform house. He flees from the rehab and descents into a world of crime as he turns into an adult. To evade the law, he resorts to framing other children in the detention facility as he seeks revenge from his family’s murderers.
Indian society and film culture are closely knit. They influence and fire each other’s imagination. This is why films are often held responsible for adverse behaviour in Indian society. How children’s impressionable minds get influenced by trauma is a critical subject that has been captured beautifully in some films. Metrolife lists out five such films that talk about juvenile delinquency:

Agneepath (2012)

Karan Malhotra’s Agneepath is a remake of the 1990 film of the same name. A young Vijay’s (Hrithik Roshan) father is lynched before his eyes. He flees Mandwa, an island off the coast of Mumbai with his pregnant mother. In Mumbai’s Dongri, he is adopted by a pimp and a drug lord Rauf Lala (Rishi Kapoor) to become his wingman. Vijay grows with a single aim of avenging his father’s death. Fifteen years later he returns to Mandwa for revenge.

Ente Veedu Appuvinteyum (2003)

Sibi Malayil’s Ente Veedu Appuvinteyum is about a film about a kid named Vasu (Kalidas Jayaram) who is brought up with love and care by his stepmother Meera (Jyothirmayi) and his father Viswanathan (Jayaram Subramaniam). However, Vasu’s insecurity is triggered when his stepmother gives birth to a boy and the baby starts getting more attention than him. This begins to create problems with Viswanathan leading Vasu to unintentionally kill the baby, which in turn gets him imprisoned in the juvenile home. Vasu later reconciles with his family and he now shares a stronger bond with them than ever.

Gully Boy (2019)

Zoya Akhtar’s Gully Boy is about the underground hip-hop scene in Mumbai’s Dharavi – one of Asia’s largest slums. The film is primarily about the hustle of an underprivileged college student Murad (Ranveer Singh) who takes on the underground rap scene in the city. The protagonist’s childhood friend Moeen (Vijay Varma) is a broken character who pushes children from his locality into drug peddling and drug dealing to survive in the streets of Mumbai.

Salaam Bombay! (1988)

Mira Nair’s ‘Salaam Bombay’ revolves around an eleven-year-old boy Krishna (Shafiq Syed). Krishna is subjected to constant bullying as a kid, and in retaliation, he shatters his elder brother’s motorcycle which puts him in debt. He winds up in Bombay’s poorest slums while trying to repay his debt to his family. He is initially sent to a travelling circus to earn money, but he eventually ends up working as a tea-seller in Bombay’s Bad Lands. He befriends a drug peddler and a beautiful young sex-worker with whom he hustles to return to his world, but life in the streets of Bombay is not for the weak.

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire is about a teenager Jamal (Dev Patel) from the slums of Mumbai who becomes a contestant on ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?’ A flashback follows as Jamal answers each question on the show as to how he knows the answer. Jamal and his brother Salim (Madhur Mittal) survive on the streets of Mumbai as beggars and pickpockets until Jamal lands a spot on the game show.