The Vaccine War Movie Review: Vivek Agnihotris Tribute To Covid Warriors, And Atmanirbharta

This is less challenging territory than others that Agnihotri has traversed in the past, most famously The Kashmir Files. Few could anger the unsung heroes of the vaccine war. the scientific community toils in the dark in thankless jobs and laboratories, even as they speak in words similar to those of the government, from emphasizing “atmanirbhartha” to criticizing India’s “anti-ecosystem”; pointed his finger at China.

It's true, there's a lot to like about The War on the Vaccines. Described as India's first "life science film", the film boldly spends most of its time on scientific terms and experiments on mice and monkeys in a modest NIV (National Institute of Virology) laboratory. No attempt was made to revive the research or awaken the highly sedating environment in which the discoveries were made. On the other hand, Agnihotri's commitment to his subject matter, with the full cooperation and access of the government, of course, often resulted in the film being shown publicly.

The vaccine wars have also almost completely hidden the human suffering from Covid, the suffering from self-control (predicted to be the result of arrogance), the deaths from lack of beds and oxygen, and the trapped governments (the only duty). awarded to the Delhi government for "increasing oxygen demand fourfold").

Watch the trailer for The Vaccine War.

The only real revelation, as the film highlights all the achievements of the then government, is the poaching of rhesus monkeys by the NIV team for experiments in the dense forests of Nagpur.

Based on a book written by the then Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) Director General Balram Bhargava, the protagonist of the science film Covid, the film uses names of real people from the ICMR and NIV, which is a rarity. . for a mainstream Bollywood film and perhaps tell its official origin story.

What makes the vaccine war even more intense is that the story of Bhargava and her team of mostly dedicated and hardworking women deserves to be told. Bhargava, played with great poignancy by Patekar, resembles the unconventional, self-absorbed heroes that films glorify; They live simply, don’t use smartphones, admit that they eat without a spoon because “their fingers are hungry,” and add butter to their food. for "intelligence" and so on and so forth.

But it is the women who fought in the Vaccine Wars who bring light and depth to the Covaxin story. Joshi plays NIV director Priya Abraham, who manages her son's wedding preparations and isolates SARS-CoV2; The head of the NIV laboratory that will create it, Pragya Yadav (Bhattacharyya), who will enlist the help of her neurosurgeon husband at a crucial point in her research on monkeys; and ICMR epidemiologist Nivedita Gupta (Oak), who had to nurse her crying, depressed son back to work. All three, especially Bhattacharya, are effective in their roles.

Women, and there are others, such as they are, do their work like everyone else, not dressed up, not careless, even if Bhargava gives a speech about it. The contribution of women scientists in anti-Covid efforts is a fact that needs to be highlighted when we celebrate the achievements of their ISRO counterparts, and this film does just that.

Hence, Bharat Biotech had cause for concern and was hardly mentioned despite its significant contribution in the development and introduction of Covaxin when NIV was initiated.

Yes, according to Bhargava's book, Abraham described SARS-CoV2 as "remarkable" when he first saw it under a microscope due to the presence of a corona on its surface - a moment recreated in the film.

However, there is only one clear villain in the Vaccine Wars, and according to Agnihotri, it is a common one: the media, or more specifically, a journalist working at The Daily Wire named Rohini Singh Dhulia. He will stop at nothing, from colluding with "big pharma", selling photos of dead people and paying the cost of death, using "toolkits" used by "weird" financiers, to showing "the government" in a negative light. bad.

While Bhargava loves his staple Indian food, Dhulia only eats 'vegan' food, which is an unsubstantiated fact.

The unnamed Prime Minister appears only once and is described by his Cabinet Secretary (Kher) as a man who wants results, doesn't believe in jargon and trusts science. Bhargava and his team said this was the first time they had been supported.

The message that emerges is that we must distinguish between government and state, “that you can hate the government, but you cannot hate India.”

The mention of Sanatan stands out, as does Macaulay. Journalists like Dhulia are compared to terrorists before writing headlines.

"The Vaccine War" directed by Vivek Agnihotri.
A film about the war on vaccines Cast: Nana Patekar, Pallavi Joshi, Nivedita Bhattacharya, Girija Oak, Raima Sen, Saptami Gowda, Anupam Kher
Rating for The Vaccine War: 2.5 stars.