Is there nothing about Tamil Cinema that makes you happy?” A few have been asking me that, especially after reading my column last week about the glorification of stalking in Tamil cinema, and the audiences’ mute acceptance of it. “Of course there are some things I am glad for,” I responded.
First of all, I am thankful that women in Tamil Cinema are no longer marrying or being asked to marry their rapist. If the value of virginity, the honour of a woman, and the trumping of Tamil culture as portrayed on screen isn’t cringe-worthy enough, to make us believe that a woman should be with, and could be happy with her violator is even worse. I am glad that at least in cinema this is passé (not so much in real life — remember the recent judgment?) and we don’t make movies like Dharmadurai (1991) and Naatamai (1994) anymore.
Second, I thank the cinema-god (there must be one), for erasing memories of the kutti sevuru from the heads of the screenwriters. A common fixture in films from the 80s until the early 2000s, the kutti sevuru (small wall by the road) was where boys/men convened to pass time over chitchat, chai and cigarettes. This was but a cover for the teasing and harassment they would unleash on women walking by. The conflict, the drama and the realisation of love in a film were placed around the ‘wall’ or a similar male space. For taking away other things from movies like Varsham Padhinaaru (1989) and Boys (2003), here’s a heartfelt ‘Thank You’ to writers.
I am elated (really) to note that the frequency of ‘item numbers’ has gone down. In most cases, they had nothing to do with the plot of the film. Intended to please a voyeuristic audience item numbers exist(ed) only to provide eye-candy in the form of skimpily clad, voluptuous women gyrating to lewd lyrics. I certainly don’t miss them.
Having said that, the number of movies that feature a TASMAC song disturbs me — they have become a fixture in most movies. There is nothing wrong with a TASMAC song per se, but I wish it wouldn’t always be men at TASMAC shops, that alcohol isn’t shown as the solution to all problems, and that TASMAC songs don’t happen only when a hero is jilted in love and then uses the opportunity to earn himself a male-following by spewing songs that demonise all women.
That TASMAC songs should change is only the beginning of a long wish list I have for Tamil cinema! If we must endure comedy-horror or ghost movies, I wish that ‘emotionally unstable women’ weren’t the only ones possessed. What about diversity in ghosts? I’d like to see women in action scenes; I’d to watch women humour me with more than their pant size. I’d like to see women asserting their sexuality, women with agency, single women.
Whatever happened to the Divyas (Mouna Ragam, 1986), Nandhinis (Mannadhil Uruthi Vendum, 1987), and the Kalkis (Kalki, 1996) of yesteryears? I’d like to see protagonists of different body shapes and sizes.
How wonderful would it be to have more disability and Dalit issues, age and religious diversity, and queerness represented in cinema? I wish we didn’t have to write heroes and heroines as characters that personify perfection. More than anything else, I wish no woman had to travel ‘one side’ on the bike behind a man to be a ‘good woman’. I’d like it better if we got completely rid of bike-(speed) breaker-breasts scenes.
I wish we had a female technician to match every male in the industry. I wish that more women made movies. I wish more such movies actually release and get enough shows in theatres. I hope our Superstar does a movie with a woman director or an all-women crew. The list goes on. You may say that I am dreaming too big, too soon. Maybe I am. But what is cinema, if it isn’t about dreams and hope?
(The writer is a Chennai-based activist, in-your-face feminist and a media glutton)