Film: Lipstick Under My Burkha
Director: Alankrita Shrivastava
Cast:Ratna Pathak, Konkona Sen Sharma, Plabita Borthakur, Aahana Kumra
In Alankrita Shrivastava’s Lipstick Under My Burkha, women in Bhopal - a second-tier city - are trapped in myriad ways. The setting is important. We see independent women in Hindi cinema almost week in week out now, but almost all of them belong to a different class. They come with jobs the majority has seldom heard of and vacation in countries the majority cannot point to on a map.
But Bhopal is different. The microcosm Shrivastava creates here is different. Here are four women with their own shackles to fight against and their own glass ceilings to break. Patriarchy is an endless pit, and they are stuck at various levels, finding different cracks to hold on to and climb above.
Lipstick Under My Burkha tells the story of four women in different stages of their lives—a teenager trying to negotiate the ways of a conservative Muslim household; another about to get married, but with dreams in her eyes, and a paramour in front of them; a middle-aged housewife kick-starting a late career surge; and a widow in her sunset years attempting to swim in a pool and against the harsh currents of prejudice that her age and aspirations seem to attract.
The appropriately named Rihana (Plabita Borthakur)—there is a performer lurking under her burkha—has a conservative family to deal with, outside, and her own need to fit in and be part of the cool crowd in college, on the inside. Ratna Pathak plays Usha—the trickiest character goes to the most experienced actress—someone almost in her sunset years but wanting to bask in life’s pleasures that passed her by. She must deal with the prying eyes of a judgemental neighbourhood, and her own guilty conscience that outwits her when she’s not looking.
Shireen (Konkona Sen Sharma) has a husband only in the books and she is, for all practical purposes, a single mother. Aahana Kumra’s Leela is by far the most interesting character. She is the phataka of the gang, and the one you cannot slot. She has a boyfriend (Vikrant Massey) with whom she has both marriage and career plans. She may have a future charted out, but she can make or break her life in a moment. And everyone is aware of her nature. Like her shenanigans in the middle of her engagement. Her mother catches her and chastises as if she just caught her daughter with her hand in the cookie jar.
That the cookie jar was with its pants down doesn’t surprise the mother. Leela is a fascinating character because she’s the sort of woman who knows what she wants, can get what she wants, is single-minded, and yet, if you ask her what feminism is, she may just give you a blank stare. Very few things matter to her, and she’s the one in the driver’s seat of both her relationship and her career. At least that’s what she wants.
This is what Shrivastava’s film does so well. Without fanfare, it establishes that feminism could mean different things for different women, and that there can never be a single definition for all. Not that all of this comes together as one organic film. Some tracks work better than the others, and it depends on whose travails you buy into more. For instance, Shireen’s arc has a fantastical nature to it that belongs in another film.
The promotions and the discourse may be of highfalutin nature, but the film is free of such ornamentation. For all the offence that the CBFC members took, you wonder what is here that they’ve never seen before. But Shrivastava’s film goes to places that one wouldn’t expect from a mainstream Hindi film, and for that alone, it works. It’s here to tell four compelling stories that put a mirror in front of patriarchy, but doesn’t bother trying to smash it. Possibly its bravest decision. At the end, the protagonists just sit around, share a smoke and take in the rare quietness in their lives. The silence conveying a bond forged in shared experience. They live to fight another day.