Introduction

Interrogating Patriarchy: Transgressive Discourses of ‘F-Rated’ Independent Hindi Films

“…The above-mentioned diverse interactions generated by F-Rated film screenings resonate with the glocal ethos of new Indian Indies such as Lipstick Under My Burkha , which blend local themes and issues with globally identifiable aesthetic visual modes and narrative strategies of storytelling (Devasundaram, 2016, 2018). Independent drama Waiting (2015) is another example of an F-Rated film amalgamating local/global sensibilities and created by a preponderantly female production team including director Anu Menon and actor Kalki Koechlin.…”

“…Kiran Rao’s Dhobi Ghat is another bellwether F-Rated film that punctuated 2010, marking it as the year in which female-fronted films were making their presence felt in the Bollywood-dominated Indian cultural milieu. Dhobi Ghat garnered critical and commercial success (Hindustan Times, 2011), and was a conspicuous instance of glocal storytelling (Devasundaram, 2016, 2018), blending its local Mumbai thematic context with a global aesthetic and a hybrid soundscape created by Oscar-winning Argentinian music composer Gustavo Santaolalla. Written and directed by Rao, the film narrative was largely the filmmaker’s personal hermeneutic of the social class divide and multiple lived experiences in Mumbai.…”

“…In my previous research (Devasundaram, 2016, 2018), I chart the emergence and development of an alternative form of contemporary independent or ‘Indie’ Indian cinema since 2010. In almost a decade, these Indie films have gained global visibility, establishing themselves as a de facto genre alongside dominant Bollywood.…”

Performativity of rape culture through fact and fiction: An exploration of India’s Daughter and Anatomy of Violence

“…Through discussion of films including Ankush (1986), Raakh (1989), Insaaf Ka Tarazu (1980) and Zakhmi Aurat (1986), she raises key questions about the graphic enactment of rape on screen and its relationship to political culture in the 1980s. There has been a distinctive departure from mainstream Hindi cinema’s ‘gratuitous and perverse’ portrayals of sexual violence towards women (Varia, 2012: 21), particularly since the emergence, around 2010, of a new wave of independent non-Bollywood Indian cinema, which is engaging with topical socio-political issues and concerns, particularly from the standpoint of women (Devasundaram, 2016, 2018). In this regard, Chatterjee (2017) argues that the ‘Nirbhaya’ case has inspired a genre of filmmaking that seeks to address the everyday gendered violence directed at women, specifically in the city where Jyoti Singh was raped and murdered.…”

“…Devashish Makhija, 2017) and Tottaa Pataaka Item Maal (The Incessant Fear of Rape, dir. Aditya Kripalani, 2018) show the leading women characters to be resolute and strong in the face of adversity (Devasundaram, 2018). Pink seeks to restore confidence in the criminal justice system and challenge rape myths about victims and perpetrators (Barn and Powers, 2018):Moving away from the tendency to frame uneducated, lower-income migrant males as the primary threat to the sexual safety of middle-class women, Pink comments on the more prevalent trends of rape and sexual violence in society: intraclass and often perpetrated by men known to women.…”