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    Irijaya Dash Lighthouse Sample Article

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    The document discusses the portrayal of queer representation in Hindi cinema over time. It notes that early films often portrayed queer characters as abnormal or the butt of jokes. However, more recent films like Aligarh (2015) and Maja Ma (2022) have shown the struggles of queer people in more realistic ways. There has also been a shift to including queer stories and characters in different genres, not just comedy, as seen in films like Bombay Talkies (2013) and Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (2019). While this movement toward more accurate and diverse representation is positive, the document argues more remains to be done to achieve true inclusivity and awareness.

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    Irijaya Dash Lighthouse Sample Article

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    s9xy8jshy6
    39 views2 pages
    The document discusses the portrayal of queer representation in Hindi cinema over time. It notes that early films often portrayed queer characters as abnormal or the butt of jokes. However, more recent films like Aligarh (2015) and Maja Ma (2022) have shown the struggles of queer people in more realistic ways. There has also been a shift to including queer stories and characters in different genres, not just comedy, as seen in films like Bombay Talkies (2013) and Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (2019). While this movement toward more accurate and diverse representation is positive, the document argues more remains to be done to achieve true inclusivity and awareness.

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    The document discusses the portrayal of queer representation in Hindi cinema over time. It notes that early films often portrayed queer characters as abnormal or the butt of jokes. However, more recent films like Aligarh (2015) and Maja Ma (2022) have shown the struggles of queer people in more realistic ways. There has also been a shift to including queer stories and characters in different genres, not just comedy, as seen in films like Bombay Talkies (2013) and Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (2019). While this movement toward more accurate and diverse representation is positive, the document argues more remains to be done to achieve true inclusivity and awareness.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    39 views2 pages

    Irijaya Dash Lighthouse Sample Article

    Uploaded by

    s9xy8jshy6
    The document discusses the portrayal of queer representation in Hindi cinema over time. It notes that early films often portrayed queer characters as abnormal or the butt of jokes. However, more recent films like Aligarh (2015) and Maja Ma (2022) have shown the struggles of queer people in more realistic ways. There has also been a shift to including queer stories and characters in different genres, not just comedy, as seen in films like Bombay Talkies (2013) and Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga (2019). While this movement toward more accurate and diverse representation is positive, the document argues more remains to be done to achieve true inclusivity and awareness.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    of 2

    Queer Representation in Hindi Cinema Through The Ages: Is it truly relevant?

    ~ Irijaya Dash.

    How a random Sunday post-brunch movie binge with my mother, an ardent Sylvia Plath
    enthusiast turned into an unfathomably thought-inciting episode which led me onto an
    ergonomic overdrive about the intricacies of Hindi Cinema’s fairly predictable, yet only seldom
    justifiable portrayal of queer-hood and it’s many layers shall never cease to amaze me.
    Serendipity is no joke. And ofcourse, the Sociology major in me found indescribable joy in the
    fact the movie in question was long-time sociologist, author and filmmaker Deepa Mehta’s Fire
    (1996).

    As someone who had stopped believing in Bollywood’s self-proclaimed tirade of “inclusivity”


    under the garb of nauseatingly stereotypical, yet commercially successful movies like Dostana
    (2008) and Student Of The Year (2012); (Yes, Cobalt Blue (2022) and Margarita With A Straw
    (2014) were the only two horsemen of my fast-ebbing patience); the idea of two remaining
    headstrong female leads finding an immoral yet far too romantic recluse in each other, produced
    and narrated in the time and age of the nineties at that; came across as a pleasant shock to me.
    (After all, horrendously blasphemous movies such as the likes of Sadak (1991) were also
    released around the same time.)

    Prior to said episode, I can now recount that if there was one genre which could be labeled the
    “Bolly-accurate” sanctum of the queer community, it’d be Comedy. Be it mass entertainers like
    Welcome (2007) and Partner (2007), or ones intended to spread social awareness about the
    gay and transgender identities via The Shubh Mangal movies (2017, 2020) and Chandigarh
    Kare Aashiqui (2021) (Ayushmann, we see you. 👀); the queer characters had always been
    portrayed as “abnormal”, ubiquitously outgoing, loud and superfluously fashionable to make
    them “stand out” from the “normal” a.k.a their heterosexual counterparts and incite all sorts of
    humorous reactions. Things take a turn for the worse when they’re hinted to be antagonistic and
    foul-natured and the pre-emptive social norms endorse negative generalizations of queer
    people negatively based solely on their sexual orientation amongst under-informed masses.

    With that era having passed, we notice an unmissable paradigm shift in Bollywood’s
    interpretation of the queer as is evident in the movies Aligarh (2015) and Maja Ma (2022), both
    of which near-realistically showcase the struggles of two married people who find it difficult to
    deal with the innumerable sour faces and societal backlash post the revelation of their sexuality.
    The influence of one’s socio-economic metric upon their romantic orientation was discovered in
    an anthology series, Karan Johar’s Bombay Talkies (2013) which is now called “ahead of its
    time” with wide acceptance. From the aegis of the same director came Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh
    Aisa Laga (2019), which shocked many owing to its portrayal of an A-list actress playing the role
    of a lesbian woman, a first for the industry; and Kapoor and Sons in 2016, which essayed the
    phenomenon of growing disparities between a set of parents and their queer son over a
    property dispute, in the background of an already dysfunctional family.

    Such neo-realistic portrayals might not exactly compensate for decades of inaccurate
    representation, but do a decent job at reinforcing one’s beliefs in Hindi Cinema’s ability to
    produce art. I’m beginning to realize it wouldn’t hurt to see contemporary Hindi filmmakers use
    the intersectionality and the social struggles of their queer characters in diverse genres such as
    slice-of-life and romance comedy. While this shift is greatly attributed to the perspective of the
    masses and their willingness to engage in the consumption of such media in a positive light,
    when it comes to greater inclusivity and awareness, tough heights remain yet to be scaled.

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