BENGALURU: A 90-minute feature film Satyavati talks about the homosexuality and ‘corrective rape’.
Though ‘corrective rape’ is a misnomer. “It is rape,” says Rajesh Umadevi, director of Sangama, about gays being forced to have sex with the opposite gender, to ‘correct’ their sexual orientation.
The film by Deepthi Tadangi is currently in its post production stage. It is about companionship of three women, out of which two are lovers. Mark Tyler Renfro, the dialogue writer says, “The so called socio-psychological mentality does not let them live in peace since lesbianism is perceived unnatural.”
The film is mainly in Hindi with a few English lines. It also has dialogues in Haryanvi.
Two years ago, Deepthi happened to stumble upon an article on ‘corrective rape’ in Africa. She did further research with the LGBT community in India and realised that this happens in our country too.
She says, “I spoke to two victims in Bengaluru. A gay boy was forced to have sex with his mother and a lesbian was attacked by her cousin, with her parents’ consent.”
She says that this sometimes happens before marriage because parents do not want to reveal their children’s sexual orientation. Deepthi says, “They think they are attracted to the same sex because they have not experienced the touch of a person from the opposite sex. They think rape could be a solution. Parents feel ashamed to talk about it to someone outside the family so they talk to cousins, brothers, uncles and plot rape against their children.”
Victims of the ‘corrective rape’ usually do not talk about it, she says, because they feel ashamed to tell anyone their parents have hurt them when they were seeking support from them.
Deepthi’s debut directorial has been a challenge and she has been struggling for two years to complete the film. She says, “The delay has mainly been due to financial problems. I wasn’t getting any investor or producer for the film.” She started with crowdfunding but could collect only ` 1 lakh. She along with a friend is funding the film. Also, a woman from UK has come forward to provide financial assistance.
But the cost has gone up with the delay.
The film, which was shot over a period of 35 days in Hyderabad, is expected to complete its post production process this month. “I am not planning a big commercial release but rather will send it for festival,” she says.
The cast also had to do extensive research on the subject. Shwetha Gupta, who plays the role of the victim’s lover, found the intimate scenes challenging. She says, “I did not have much exposure to the LGBT community before. For this film, I met several people from the community to understand the nuances. Deepthi is very demanding. She wanted the actors to feel from within. I had set a limit even while doing intimate scenes with a man on screen, so doing them with a woman was a huge challenge.”
Iti Acharya had to take an intense workshop for her de-glam role. She plays the role of a roommate to the lesbian couple. She says, “I play the role of a Haryanvi girl. I had to change my body language for the role and work on the accent.”
On the contrary, Fira who played the role of a victim of corrective rape says that as there were multiple cases coming up in the media at that time, she did not feel like it is something new. She says, “It is a normal story of four people until that part comes where my character is raped. I wouldn’t say playing it was challenging. I have lots of friends from the LGBT community who face several issues. I haven’t met anyone who has faced ‘corrective rape’ but there were other issues.”