“Gangubai Kathiawadi” (M) ****

WRITTEN and directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali, this big movie from India adapts a tale in the true-crime reportage bestseller “Mafia Queens of Mumbai” by Hussain Zaidi.

In the 1960s, Gangubai Kathiawadi was tricked and trafficked into prostitution in Mumbai’s Kamathipura red-light zone. 

Using a survivor’s ruthlessness and ability to cultivate political connections, Gangubai rose to become a madam involved in drugs and violent crime. She then parlayed her gangland prestige into a media campaign for sex workers’ rights, even – according to legend – a meeting to discuss these with India’s first Prime Minister Nehru himself.

You might expect a movie with antecedents and credentials like these to be raw and not suitable for young folk. That kind of conclusion diminishes the film’s merits. There’s not a word in its dialogue nor a visual image that might generate a frisson of something that you wouldn’t want your delicately-born-and-raised old granny to hear or use. 

The film runs for 152 minutes. I watched it alone at a special screening timed to let me write this review in time for you to read as if nothing untoward had happened to screw up its release date. 

It’s historical, a drama, a comedy, a musical and a morality tale. Most of all, it’s a message-fun movie that triumphs over the chatter of its Indian language. And as Gangubai, Alia Bhatt is not only attractive enough to eat; despite the adverse social stigma of the skin trade, her delivery of the character is an admirable delight.

At Dendy

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