The film’s sound design deliberately isolates the audience into Chitti’s perspective—muffled dialogues, selective amplification of vibrations. Disability is not tragic; it enables Chitti to read micro-expressions and physical cues that hearing characters miss. This reverses the gaze: the “disabled” man sees truth, while the “able” village is deaf to injustice.
Sukumar’s Rangasthalam (2018) is a period action-drama set in the 1980s in a fictional village, depicting the exploitation of irrigation resources by a feudal upper-caste president. This paper argues that the film innovatively uses the protagonist’s (Chitti Babu’s) hearing disability not as a liability but as a narrative device to deconstruct ableism, amplify subaltern resistance, and critique systemic corruption in rural India. Rangasthalam -2018- 720p WEBRip x265 AAC - HQ H...
Control over the irrigation pump symbolizes control over life. The President charges extortionate fees for water, mirroring neoliberal resource privatization. Chitti’s rebellion begins not with a speech but by repairing a broken pump for free—an act of reclaiming communal infrastructure. The film’s sound design deliberately isolates the audience
Rangasthalam succeeds as a commercial art film by subverting the disabled sidekick trope, using sensory storytelling, and grounding conflict in real rural economic struggles. It remains a landmark in Telugu cinema for its narrative sophistication and political sharpness. Sukumar’s Rangasthalam (2018) is a period action-drama set