Through a woman filmmaker's perspective

For the longest time, apart from actress Sheela, mainstream Malayalam cinema didn’t have a woman filmmaker. Anjali Menon can rightly be considered the first commercially successful woman filmmaker, though she has often shunned the woman tag. However, Anjali delivered her first commercial hit, Bangalore Days, in 2014, a year after Revathy S Varmha’s Maad Dad, which means that for the three quarters of a century since Malayalam cinema came into existence, the audience has been getting the thoughts and perspectives of only one gender in films, that of men. It took another year for Sreebala Menon to make her debut film — Dileep-starrer Love 24/7.

This year, Malayalam cinema will see six women directors either releasing or starting off their films — Anjali Menon again, Roshni Dinaker, Geetu Mohandas, Revathy S Varmha, Soumya Sadanandan and debutante Leela. We ask these filmmakers how different their perspectives are and the challenges they face.

If you live in a society where there is plenty of interaction between the sexes, one can assess what the opposite gender thinks, to a certain extent, says Revathy S Varmha, whose multilingual biopic on athlete PT Usha will kick off this year. However, at the end of the day, a film made by a man will still be his vision, she admits. “Whether it is about drinking, the attitude towards the opposite sex, the concept of beauty, view of life, it’s all that of a man, and a young man these days, as we have plenty of them coming into the field.”

This applies to what each character speaks; what even a woman character speaks is what a man wishes her to say, she says. “When a woman directs a film, you will definitely get to hear a lot of what women want their parents, friends, children or even society to say.” An example she cites is a line of Dulquer’s character from Bangalore Days where he tells Parvathy’s character, ‘I prefer to walk with you, not after you’. “I don’t think a man would have written that line ever, it’s something every woman wants to hear from a man,” the director says.

The phenomenon is not restricted to cinema but applies to all fields, be it art, literature or even history, says Geetu Mohandas. “History is also ‘his story’, not hers. What society has told us and behaved towards us will all reflect on how you tell a story or make a piece of art, whether you are a man or a woman.” However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that one is better than the other, for we need both, she says. It also doesn’t mean that the characters should all be women for a woman’s perspective to come through, according to her. “The central character in my first film Liar’s Dice was a woman, but there was a man who was equally important. Moothon, on the other hand, is told through the perspective of a man. It’s not in the stories but in the telling that my thoughts will reflect,” she says.

Does that also mean that there are fewer chances of sexism creeping into a film if a woman makes it? Geetu doesn’t agree. “There are many amazing male directors who pick subjects on women and portray their points of view beautifully. Also, one can’t assume that all women directors will be gender sensitive,” she says.

In fact, Leela, who made news as the first woman to direct a film from Kerala’s tribal community, says that she often found herself putting the woman character a step below the man, while writing her debut movie,

Karinthandan

. “There is a woman character in my film who is as important as Karinthandan. She is as strong as him but when I was writing I realised that automatically the woman came out as less than the man.

So, what exactly has been stopping women from making their own films all these years? Filmmaking, says Revathy, is not a profession which suits the ‘moral standards’ of our society. “It’s not a time bound profession where you can go at 9 am and reach home at 5 pm. You can’t do it wondering whether your husband has had his tea, or the stove is off, at the back of your mind. You have to be fully into it and it’s a great responsibility,” she says. “You might have to travel with the crew and stay in new locations. Above all, you need an open mind and a strong one too. You need to know what exactly you want, when to say ‘no’ and at what distance to keep people.” It depends almost entirely on the support of the family for a married woman, if she is not single, according to Revathy.

The bigger problem for woman filmmakers, according to her, is pleasing the audience. “Even when they finally get an opportunity to make a film, women often succumb to the pressure of catering to the male audience. The audience are mostly men though the population is equally divided. So, there is eventually the responsibility towards the producer. Women can’t really make a film succeed by watching it in groups in theatres. Ultimately, it’s a male-driven industry.”

Anjali Menon had expressed similar sentiments when we spoke to her earlier. “The industry reality is that if you want to make a very wide film, you can still do the same thing in a fresh way, but it has to be palatable to the general audience. A film doesn’t have to be sexist but the audience, which is male, has a set of values,” she had told us.

All filmmakers, however, agree that the way for change is to have more number of woman on a set. And things are definitely changing for the better, they say. “In 2000, when I started as an actor, there was only me and a hairdresser as women, but now on my own set, there are three to four women, that too in power positions,” says Geetu, while Anjali had said, “There are more women behind the scenes in every film of mine. It should come to a situation where only work matters, and not your gender.”