No discussion on crimes against women, perpetuation of gender roles or rape culture seems complete without at least one person pointing an accusing finger at films, especially Bollywood. The industry is an easy punching bag, a convenient explanation to fall back on when all the other nuances of the complex question “what causes India to treat its women so abysmally?” eludes us. This is because of the extremely obvious objectification of women in the film industry. Bollywood films are replete with hypersexual images of women: “item numbers” are hugely popular, skimpily clad women on glossy magazines sell, commercial hits are often those that are well-stocked with sexist jokes and misogynist lyrics, and barring some films with strong female protagonists, the industry continues to tirelessly showcase the same female prototype in only minutely different shades.
Until now, the cause-effect relationship — or the lack thereof — between Bollywood and gender discrimination was discussed without evidence. Now a United Nations-sponsored global study on female characters in films shows that Indian films (and not just Bollywood) are responsible for “deep-seated discrimination and pervasive gender stereotyping of women and girls.” The study commissioned by the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media and supported by the Rockefeller Foundation and the U.N. shows that women are mostly absent in lead roles, are judged according to their looks, and almost never depicted as scientists and engineers. An alarming 35 per cent of female characters in Indian films are shown with some nudity and the number of women directors (9.1 per cent), producers (15.2 per cent) and scriptwriters (12.1 per cent) in the industry is very low compared to the global average. If the representation of women in films and filmmaking is discriminatory, then we must first examine why this is so.
Pandering to the massesFirst, why do filmmakers make films? Is their intention to engage, entertain or educate the viewer, or attract profits, or a combination of these factors? Most Bollywood blockbusters show that Indian audiences want entertainment from films and the industry consistently panders to this need. Unfortunately, offensive lyrics and comedy seem to appeal to the viewers. This was evident when the embarrassingly vulgar “Grand Masti,” despite being torn apart by film critics, still managed to enter the prestigious “100 crore club” of Bollywood. Similarly, singer and rapper Yo Yo Honey Singh’s songs, whose lyrics caused activists to file cases against him, continue to top the charts and reverberate through the nightclubs of the country.
The results of the study are therefore unsurprising: the Indian film industry seems no different from society itself. Just as Indians protest over rapes but laugh at rape jokes, and demand punishment for crimes against women but engage in everyday sexism, the industry too condemns attacks on women while simultaneously portraying them as sexual objects.
In France and Germany, two other countries that were part of the study, this does not seem to be the case. In French films, 18.8 per cent of women were shown as working professionals while in reality, according to World Bank figures, 44.4 per cent of women in the country constitute the workforce. This is a serious discrepancy. In India, on the other hand, women constitute more than 22 per cent of the workforce according to the International Labour Organization— not much higher than the number of women shown as working professionals in films (15.6 per cent).
“There are woefully few women CEOs in the world, but there can be lots of them in films,” U.N. Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka said when the study was released. “How do we encourage a lot more girls to pursue science, technology and engineering careers? By casting droves of women in STEM, politics, law and other professions today in movies.”
Why then do Indian filmmakers not make more films with stronger female characters, include more women in the process of filmmaking and depict women as intelligent thinking beings rather than sums of their body parts?
“It is hard to sell women-centric films and concepts,” actor Kangana Ranaut once said. Yet, the actor bravely played the simpleton Rani — a character who is rejected by her fiancée, but who slowly emerges to become a fiercely independent woman instead of pining away for him (as would be the expectation). “Queen” grossed over Rs.600 million in India alone, besides doing well overseas, proving that not all is bleak in the industry.
The economics of filmmaking cannot be given as an excuse for male-centric characters — the audience nowadays seems more willing to see stronger female characters. Parineeti Chopra’s portrayal of Meeta, a geeky, unusual woman scientist in “Hasee Toh Phasee,” was also an admirable attempt by the scriptwriter in fashioning an atypical female character.
That most characters are shown in some nudity is not shocking either. Walk into any theatre in any part of the country where women are gyrating on screen and you will the audience hooting, cheering, passing lewd remarks. A large number of men, and some women, often blame the actor for “inviting” the remarks through her clothes, seductive pose, dance moves and so on. If the actor is willing to strip on screen then she cannot demand both autonomy and respect off screen seems to be the prevalent sentiment. So while actors try hard to separate themselves from their roles, the line is more blurred for the audience or sections of the media. The subtext of this study is that filmmaking needs to be a more responsible exercise — less nudity and more dialogues for women, more substantive roles, and a larger presence of women in filmmaking itself can go a long way in influencing the way people think. After all, as Uma Chakravarthy pointed out, the beliefs and myths of the past that formed the basis of our understanding of women are what we perpetuate now, generation after generation. And that’s what films do too. But it’s never late to question these — slowly and steadily.
radhika.s@thehindu.co.in
