There is a speech every Indian filmmaker eventually gives about violence in their own film, and it goes: it is not gratuitous, it serves the story, the audience is smarter than you think. Nani gave that speech in Mumbai this week for The Paradise. He also gave a second one that was considerably more interesting.
Speaking at the film’s Mumbai press event ahead of the 24 September release, the actor addressed the adult certification head on. Per Bollywood Hungama, Nani said the film “doesn’t have violence for the sake of violence” and went on to say that “you can watch this film with your families, parents”.
Read those two clauses next to the certificate the CBFC actually issued and you have the whole argument about Indian film certification in one press quote.
What He Actually Said
The quotes across outlets are consistent, which is worth noting because press meet reporting frequently is not.
India.com reported Nani acknowledging plainly that there is “a lot of violence” in the film, which is a rarer admission than it sounds. Most stars spend a certification press conference insisting the film is milder than the rating implies. Nani did the opposite. He conceded the volume and argued about the purpose.
The Sunday Guardian carried him saying violence in the film “isn’t added without purpose”, which is the same position stated more formally. CineTalkers reported him addressing the censor process itself and the modifications that came out of it.
So the position is: yes it is violent, yes it deserved the certificate, no it is not decorative, and yes, take your mother.
Why The Contradiction Is Not Actually A Contradiction
It reads like a gaffe. It is not, quite. What Nani is describing is the gap between what an ‘A’ certificate legally means and what Indian audiences think it means.
An ‘A’ certificate is an age restriction. It says under-18s are not admitted. It does not say the film is unsuitable for adults watching together, and it certainly does not say the film is disreputable. But in Indian exhibition practice, an ‘A’ has functioned for decades as a commercial penalty. It cuts off the family audience, it restricts television syndication, it makes some distributors nervous, and it carries a faint whiff of the disreputable that has almost nothing to do with the actual content.
Which is why stars end up in this exact rhetorical position: defending a certificate while simultaneously assuring the family audience that the certificate does not really apply to them.
Why This Matters Right Now
The timing is not incidental. The CBFC has been operating under revised guidelines that introduced a more granular set of age bands, including the U/A 16+ category, and the industry is currently in the middle of working out what those bands actually mean in practice.
The same week Nani was defending an ‘A’, another release was making the opposite case. The Vvaan cleared certification with a U/A 16+ and, per the film’s team, zero cuts or modifications. Two films, the same certification regime, two completely different outcomes, both being used as marketing.
That is the useful thing about this news cycle. For years the certification conversation in India has been abstract, conducted in op-eds about artistic freedom. This week it is concrete. Here is a film that took an ‘A’ and is arguing the rating is fine. Here is a film that got a 16+ with no cuts and is arguing that is a milestone. The audience gets to watch both and decide whether the bands mean anything.
The Commercial Question Underneath
The Paradise opened to over ₹60 crore worldwide across premieres and day one, so the certificate visibly did not hurt the opening. It did not have to. Advance booking for a star vehicle of this size is driven by the fanbase, and the fanbase does not check the certificate.
Where an ‘A’ bites is days four through fourteen, when a film needs the walk-in family audience to sustain. If The Paradise holds through next week, the industry will read it as evidence that the ‘A’ penalty has softened. If it drops, half the trade will blame the certificate rather than the mixed reviews, because blaming the certificate is easier than blaming the film.
Director Srikanth Odela built his reputation on Dasara, a film with its own appetite for rural violence. Nobody buying a ticket to an Odela film is arriving expecting restraint. The certificate, in that sense, is honest advertising.
Bengaluru Baath Take
Nani is right about the certificate and wrong about the sentence he used to defend it. An ‘A’ film is an ‘A’ film. If the violence is purposeful, say so and stand behind it. The “you can watch it with your parents” line is a commercial reflex, and it undercuts the better argument he was already making, which is that adult certification is a description of an audience, not a verdict on a film.
The Indian industry will stop treating the ‘A’ as a scarlet letter roughly five minutes after a major star stops apologising for one. Nani got about eighty percent of the way there this week. Someone is going to have to cover the last twenty.
More On Bengaluru Baath
- The CBFC Rewrote Its Rulebook This Month. Then It Passed A Film Without Touching A Frame
- Nani’s The Paradise Opens To Over ₹60 Crore And A Critical Shrug. Both Of Those Are Real.
Sources
- Bollywood Hungama, Mumbai press meet quotes
- India.com, press meet coverage
- Sunday Guardian, press meet coverage
- CineTalkers, certification and modifications
