Directed by : Ramin Bahrani

For the poor, there are only two ways to get to the top, crime or politics. Is it like that in your country too?


Spoilers ahead..

Based on Aravind Adiga's best selling novel 'The White Tiger', Balram (Adarsh Gourav) who is a lower caste halwai at his village, plots his way into being a driver for a wealthy rich family of The Stork (Mahesh Manjrekar). A tale of how he makes out of there and becomes one of top entrepreneur by committing some crime.

There's clear similarity with Parasite, how Balram fools around to get close to the Stork and eventually becoming driver of The Stork's son Ashok (Rajkummar Rao). We get to see the divide of upper and lower class, many times Balram is ridiculed and treated like a trash by the Stork or his brother Mukesh 'The Mongoose' (Vijay Maurya). In one of best scenes, Mongoose and Stroke are behaving like sweet masters much different to their routine way, as they are keen to get signature of Balram for a car accident which was rather fault of Ashok's wife Pinky (Priyanka Chopra) drunk driving. It is also the main point of the plot when Balram realizes no matter how much he devotes to his masters like every other servant does, he would get replaced one day.

Poverty, upper class ruling over lower class like they aren't humans, politics, corruption etc are some of the topics that the narrative goes through with the story told direct by Balram who tells us how he made it this far. And Balram has a family that never really supports him, rather his grandmother wants his earned money every month. So, he is mostly on his own, trying to lead a normal life which isn't easy when everyone wants a piece of you in some way. 

Adarsh Gourav is excellent, whether its how he showcases the clever intelligent mind he has got, or how there's a constant anger building inside him for not really getting what he should despite being loyal always. I specially enjoyed the scene where he looks in the plate just after Pinky had given him important advice, or the scene where he feels his mind was going crazy letting his anger out. Happy they showed less of his scenes when he's successful now, they weren't totally convincing for me, maybe because the idea of never getting caught  looked odd even though its justified by referring him as the 'White Tiger' considered to be one of rarest. 

Love the dig Balram makes indirectly at Slumdog Millionaire, as unlike that film, he has to get dirty and kill his master Ashok, only then he could dream of becoming a big person. Though in the end he also turns out to be like Ashok, bribing police to setup his business. The only difference however is, Balram is friendly to other drivers and doesn't see them as someone low or insignificant as Stork's family would do. I wish he killed Mongoose or Stork instead of Ashok, just didn't feel right, and they even have a dialogue where he is thinking the same. 

RajKumar Rao is strangely a weak link, not just the accent but his character comes across confused, always changing sides, almost dominated by his father Stork. Priyanka Chopra is decent, as only person who almost in entire role supports Balram planting the idea how much Balram deserves more than be a driver only, though her accent also was little irritating. 

One thing I kept wondering, having all the money why would Balram not travel in an AC Class. 

Certainly a better movie than the very hammy Slumdog Millionaire but doesn't reach the level of Parasite for me, yet 'The White Tiger' is a pretty good watch with Adarsh Gourav performance stealing the show. 

My Rating : 6.5/10