Radhika Apte, who was recently seen in Saali Mohabbat, has spoken candidly about the dangers of romanticising obsession, control, and emotional abuse in cinema. While her character in the film commits
an extreme act after discovering her husband’s infidelity, the actor firmly believes such behaviour should never be mistaken for passion or glorified as love.
Radhika Apte On Why Her Character’s Actions Should Not Be Romanticised
In an interview with Hindustan Times, Radhika explained that her character’s breaking point is rooted in prolonged injustice rather than emotional intensity, “That’s the problem. I don’t think that in the film, what happens is something happening out of passionate love. It’s happening because of accumulated acute injustice and treatment of her. I don’t like to glorify that as some passionate love for the partner or anybody else in the world. This is where we go wrong on how we view it. It’s clearly happening from being treated badly over and over again,” she said.
She further challenged the cultural tendency to label suffering as devotion, “In our culture, these acts are mistaken as love, we call it love. But it’s not really love when we have to compromise our happiness repeatedly to please somebody. You can’t call it love. I don’t agree with the notion.”
‘Obedience Is Not Love, It’s Power And Control’
Calling out long-standing cinematic tropes, Radhika criticised how obedience and control are often framed as respect or passion, especially in Bollywood narratives, “Whether it’s husband or husband’s family or your parents, listening to them and doing whatever they want you to do, is not love. If anybody expects the other person to compromise their happiness, to do what you ask them to do, that’s not love. True love is to see the other person happy and obedience is not love. That’s just power and control. And I’m sick of it being called as love or respect,” she said.
The actor didn’t mince words while addressing the larger impact of such storytelling, “It’s awful and horrible. I think we should stop making these films and telling these stories. We are glorifying obsession and controlled power as passion and that’s a big mistake.”
About Saali Mohabbat
Saali Mohabbat is a drama-thriller set in a small town, revolving around a housewife whose seemingly ordinary life unravels after two sudden deaths alter everything around her. The film places emotional trauma, silence, and suppressed anger at its core, rather than framing its events as acts of romance.
The film stars Radhika Apte in the lead role, alongside Sauraseni Maitra, Divyendu Sharma, Anshumaan Pushkar, and Anurag Kashyap. The project is backed by producers Jyoti Deshpande, Dinesh Malhotra, Vipin Agnihotri, and Manish Malhotra.
