美国国家公共电台 NPR Feminist Films Push Boundaries In India

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

We're going to spend the next few minutes talking movies. If the new "Wonder Woman" film was part of your plan for the weekend and you are wondering just where she came from, we will tell you in a few minutes. But first to India, where one of the great classics of the film industry there, "Mother India," turns 60 this year.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MOTHER INDIA")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS #1: (As character, singing in foreign language).

MARTIN: The heroine is a paragon 1 of traditional virtues 2 and maternal 3 strength. Now, critics say Bollywood hasn't changed very much when it comes to depicting 4 older women, and younger women are still too often props 5 in the shadow of a male lead. But NPR's Julie McCarthy tells us about a recent crop of film that focuses exclusively on women and their desires.

JULIE MCCARTHY, BYLINE 6: The light-hearted "Lipstick 7 Under My Burkha" follows the secret lives of four women.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "LIPSTICK UNDER MY BURKHA")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS #2: (As character, singing in foreign language).

MCCARTHY: Aahana Kumra portrays 8 a feisty beautician with irrepressible lust 9. Her character, a Hindu, has a sizzling affair with a young Muslim photographer whom she cannot marry. And her overt 10 sexual desires are splashed up on the screen with unusual raw humor.

AAHANA KUMRA: Everybody's squirming in their places and going like, oh, my God, like, what are we watching, you know? And I think that’s interesting to watch because art should make you uncomfortable. Or it should make you think.

MCCARTHY: The 60-something character Auntie devours 11 pulp 12 fiction loaded with soft porn. She's disgraced when her family discovers that she's been reading steamy passages over the phone to seduce 13 a swimming instructor 14 half her age. Actress Ratna Pathak plays Auntie and says a widow with a libido 15 is a radical 16 idea in Indian cinema.

RATNA PATHAK: People get a bit shocked by the idea of post-60 generation having a sexual drive at all, which is ridiculous.

MCCARTHY: Debate has swirled 17 around "Lipstick" for this very reason. It reveals unexplored aspects of women's lives. The film premiered in Tokyo and not India. Director Alankrita Shrivastava says India's censorship board refused to certify 18 the film on the grounds it was, quote, "lady-oriented."

ALANKRITA SHRIVASTAVA: That means that you have no idea about the fact that women and men have equal rights in this country. It makes me feel like they don't want women to tell their stories. They want women to keep quiet and shut up. I think patriarchy's alive and kicking, and its roots are really deep.

MCCARTHY: Shrivastava successfully contested the ban, but the board has yet to certify the movie. She says multidimensional roles that project women as complex characters are virtually absent from mainstream 19 Bollywood, which she says persists in portraying 20 women as objects.

SHRIVASTAVA: These item songs with these double meaning lyrics 21 and the camera is randomly 22 going up and down a woman's body. It's producers. It's actors. It's directors. Everybody's complicit, actually, in the creation of this kind of culture. And the excuse is always it sells.

MCCARTHY: Director Aparna Sen predicts that her film "Sonata 23" won't make money but break even.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "SONATA")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS #3: (As character) What kind of people are we?

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS #4: (As character) Totally decadent 24, but happy.

MCCARTHY: Her small-budget English-language production challenges conventional norms of family and friendship. The ensemble 25 of three single childless women in middle age appeals to a small urban elite 26, but perhaps not mainstream audiences. Director Sen says India has a bias 27 against being single.

APARNA SEN: If you're single by choice, they think that something's wrong with you. You're flawed in some way. Just the depiction 28 of single women having a blast, having wine, you know, expressing their anxieties and their loneliness - female bonding on cinema is very rare. Very, very rare.

MCCARTHY: Four men were the producers of "Sonata."

SEN: Is that wonderful? Four men who supported women, supported middle-aged 29 women (laughter) - four young men, by the way.

MCCARTHY: Sheela Sehgal, a Delhi University literature professor, was among a handful in the theater one recent Friday morning who came to watch "Sonata."

Did it appeal to you?

SHEELA SEHGAL: Absolutely. It's the stark 30 reality of Indian women. They're not the younger generation, nor do they feel completely grown old. It's that dilemma 31. We all will go through that phase. I don't know why they don't make such movies more.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "ANAARKALI OF AARAH")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character) Hello, check. Hello, hello, hello. One, two, four. One, two, four.

MCCARTHY: Perhaps the film that pushes the theme of sexual choice farthest is "Anaarkali Of Aarah." It's a portrait of a singer who earns a living performing suggestive songs before an all-male audience in small town India. She's molested 32 by a prominent figure in town but exacts revenge, shaming him in public during a performance. Swara Bhaskar stars as Anaarkali and says mainstream Bollywood wouldn't risk offending middle-class morality with such a character.

SWARA BHASKAR: Anaarkali is promiscuous 33. She's unapologetic about it. She's a threatening person. She's a little - you know, she's a bit mad. And she wins in the end. And she wins by her own means. No man comes and helps her.

MCCARTHY: Sexual violence against women burst out into the open in India after horrific high-profile incidents like the fatal gang rape 34 of a young woman in New Delhi in 2012. But the film "Anaarkali" is meant to send a powerful message that no matter how seductive a woman may be or what profession she's in, she still has the right to say no to sexual advances. Bhaskar says without her consent...

BHASKAR: It doesn't matter if she was dancing naked on the stage. You still cannot touch her without her consent.

MCCARTHY: Small films are carving 35 out new rules for women in the cinema. It may be a while, though, before India's mass culture, addicted 36 to happy ending love stories and fantasy adventures, is ready to accept this path-breaking entertainment. Julie McCarthy, NPR News, New Delhi.