‘Bandit Queen’

Director Shekhar Kapur and writer Mala Sen have bonded dynamic adventure, romance and fiery social protest together with an electrifying effectiveness. Kapur and Sen place Devi at the worst possible conjunction of caste and gender. A member of the lowly Mallah caste, she in effect is sold into slavery as a child and is promptly raped by her husband. Devi (Seema Biswas, pictured) survives, propelled inevitably into an outlaw gang (Cinemax Wednesday at 11 p.m.).