Doctor G movie review: If a film does not treat its own serious theme with respect, how can we take it seriously?

Language: Hindi Cast: Ayushmann Khurrana, Rakul Preet Singh, Sheeba Chadha, Shefali Shah, Abhay Chintamani Mishr      Director: Anubhuti Kashyap Star rating: 2.5/5 Having played a sperm donor in Vicky Donor (2012), a man with erectile dysfunction in _Shubh Mangal Saavdhan_ (2017) and a youngster coming to terms with his premature baldness in _Bala_ (2019), Ayushmann Khurrana is now dealing with a different set of body parts and bodily functions – except that this time they are not his. His new film in theatres, Doctor G, is about a medico who wants to specialise in orthopaedics but secures admission in gynaecology. Instead of immersing himself in his work and studies, Dr Uday Gupta decides to bide his time in the department while preparing to take the entrance exam again. Why? Because his narrow, traditionalist, patronising worldview dictates that gynaecology is a branch of medicine that is of women, for women and by women. Uday shares a home with his mother in Bhopal. His early struggles with women patients in a local government hospital are as much to do with the fact that he takes gynaecology lightly as with the women’s unwillingness to see a male doctor. As the only man among them, he finds himself trivialised by his classmates too since they are convinced he will not stick around. The HoD, Dr Nandini Srivastava ( Shefali Shah ) is tough on him because she sees that he is not sincere about this stream. Meanwhile, Uday complicates matters further by falling for his classmate, Dr Fatima ( Rakul Preet Singh ).

Debutant director Anubhuti Kashyap’s _Doctor G_ joins Uday on the rocky road from reluctance to awakening and finally, complete commitment. The latter – complete commitment – is what Doctor G itself lacks. The theme yields several crucial conversations and plenty of laughter. The actors and writers (screenplay: Sumit Saxena, Saurabh Bharat, Vishal Wagh and Anubhuti Kashyap herself) give the hospital a real feel without drowning us in medical jargon. But though the film has remarkable clarity on certain matters, it is fuzzy in its exposition of too much else. For instance, without turning the narrative into a textbook or a lecture, it does a spiffing job of explaining why Uday should not have examined a patient when alone in a room with her, the risks of an abortion on a minor and the protocols mandated in such a case (making it that rare Hindi film portraying abortion as an acceptable choice for a woman). Nandini repeatedly tells Uday that to become a good gynaecologist he must “lose the male touch”, and his classmates emphasise the need to make his patients feel comfortable around him. Yet a scene that appears designed to be comical involves Uday actually smacking a woman in labour who grabs his arm, misconduct for which he is not chided by anyone. Mistreatment of mothers-to-be and a dismissive attitude to women’s pain is not uncommon in hospital settings, and here is a film that positions such a scene as comedy but positions itself as an awareness builder. The writers do well in keeping Uday steady in his stance on the morality of a sexual relationship between an adult and a minor in the film. However, there is no physical force involved, but the script leaves the meaning of statutory rape and the need for such a law unclear. This is an opportunity lost, considering the continuing social resistance to progressive legal definitions of consent. (Minor spoiler in this paragraph) As a layperson watching Uday oversee an emergency delivery in a hospital corridor, I could not help but wonder why the mother’s dignity was not preserved despite the constraints of the situation and that space. Were there no screens available in the whole building, and not a single staffer available to bring those screens to the spot instead of allowing a crowd to gape while a woman popped out a baby in public? Uday is reprimanded for that episode, but for very different reasons. (Spoiler alert ends) The script seems to be swimming along well in normalising a Muslim and a Tamilian in Uday’s class…till it does not. The reason for Fatima’s hesitation regarding Uday remains ambiguous. You don’t hear women, he is told by more than one woman in his life. It is true that Uday is an absolute jerk when we first meet him, but to be fair to him here, I was not entirely sure I could hear Fatima either – that she does not want to commit to him is plainly stated, what is blurred is why. This is particularly noticeable because Uday’s mother declares in black and white that religious differences are not an issue. Of course this is the standard and safe Hindu-man-plus-woman-from-a-minority-community that inter-community romances in Bollywood usually are, but that is a separate discussion. More glaring is the totally silly mention of Rajinikanth stuffed into a line delivered by the Tamilian lady because in The Gospel According to Bollywood, apparently that is what all Tamilians do. Not so cool after all, huh, Team Doctor G?

The one character written with depth and lucidity throughout is Uday’s lively widowed mother played by the formidable Sheeba Chadha who, in this film, tops even the diffident yet ultimately rock solid Mom she was in Badhaai Do earlier this year. Her graph and Uday’s relationship with her form the most consistent thread in Doctor G, which begs the question why writers who conceptualise these lovely supporting roles for this gifted artiste seem unable to envision her as a lead. Hers is the stand-out performance in Doctor G. None of the other characters is backed by such solid writing. Rakul deserves so much more. As for Ayushmann , he could probably pull off Uday in his sleep – he is good enough, but his acting here does not give us anything that he has not delivered before. Just when it appears that Doctor G has got its act together though, it wraps up with a ridiculous song accompanying the end credits that, in its filming, contradicts everything that has been said until then. Doctor G is the story of a man who learns to take women seriously. And along comes this number, with Uday/Ayushmann in baggy doctor’s garb singing Mera dil dhak dhak karta hai surrounded by women in tight, tiny attire in the same colour combination while Fatima/Rakul in a figure-hugging, body-baring outfit heaves her bosom and thrusts it towards him as he lies down.

If a film does not treat its own chosen theme with respect, how can we take it seriously?

Rating: 2.5 (out of 5 stars) 

This review was first published when Doctor G was released in theatres. The film is now streaming on Netflix. 

Anna M.M. Vetticad is an award-winning journalist and author of The Adventures of an Intrepid Film Critic. She specialises in the intersection of cinema with feminist and other socio-political concerns. Twitter: @annavetticad, Instagram: @annammvetticad, Facebook: AnnaMMVetticadOfficial Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News ,  India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.