Women characters in mainstream Indian cinema swing between the extremes of being submissive and over-the-top. Filmmaker Aditi Banerjee, currently based in Bengaluru, wants to bridge this gap in her work-in-progress, a five-part mini series, Happily Ever After.
The film tells the story of a woman whose husband is cheating on her, a young mother tempted by an online chat-room and an older polyamorous woman exploring the worlds of love, desire, friendship and separation.
“I wanted to break stereotypes. The woman who goes into chat-rooms is looking at her body and desire in a new way and the polyamorous woman is from a conservative family, who wears saris. I don’t think that sexuality and sexual desire belong to a particular kind of woman. It exists within the everyday domestic space,” says Aditi whose work has been telecast on National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Al Jazeera and Fox.
She has also taught at National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad and Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bengaluru. Aditi says the characters are inspired by people in real life. “But are not really them. I feel one needs to transform characters to really own them as a writer-director. There are elements inspired by people who have had similar experiences. It is an amalgamation of what I have observed in people, by talking to them and some of my own experiences of being a woman in contemporary India.”
The characters are counterpoints to each other.
Aditi explains: “What one character wants, the other has. For instance, the young mother desires the life of the one who owns an office and works in the corporate world, but doesn’t know that character has a husband who is an adulterer. Each of the three characters depict aspects of love, desire, relationships and marriage.”
The subject of sexuality is complex and nuanced and so Aditi has been particular in her treatment of it. She researched for a year before working on the series.
“As far as polyamory is concerned, I was clear that I did not want to portray it as something exotic. I wanted to put it in a domain that is fairly realistic and that it is just some of the choices we make. To me, the way to look at a preference is to integrate it into our everyday life. I read a book called The Ethical Slut by Dossie Easton and Janet Hardy to understand what polyamory means. I attended several poly meetings, spoke to people and understood their perspective.
“I had even encountered people at the startup I was working in and gleaned different ideas of motherhood. It is a complex relationship. In my first draft, the character of the cheating husband was all bad, but I changed that later. A few peers were reviewing the script. As I had worked in making documentaries, the observation was one of the few tools that helped me write.”
At present Aditi is raising funds for the series through crowdfunding.
“One of the reasons for crowdfunding is that it distributes ownership among people, and then no single producer can tell me ‘this is how I want you to do this’. To me, filmmaking benefits from collaboration. Once the series is completed, I would like to send it to film festivals.”
The cast includes Virginia Rodrigues, Dilnaz Irani and Rachna Gupta.
“The casting process took long. Virginia speaks Kannada and is from Bengaluru. Dilnaz is from South Mumbai, and has the city in her in some ways. Rachna is from Amritsar and a graduate from the National School of Drama.”
Prahlad Gopakumar, who has shot a National Award-winning film, is the cinematographer.
Check the Happily Ever After Facebook page for details.
