Posted on 06/18/2004 8:52:52 AM PDT by NYer
A hundred Hindu fundamentalists have attacked and vandalized cinemas in several Indian towns, tearing down posters of the recently released film Girlfriend. The film deals with lesbianism and related themes. The fundamentalists see this as an affront to Indian culture.
The most censorious critics, however, have been India’s gay and lesbian activists. They say the film is a 'homophobic, hetero-patriarchal' portrayal of lesbianism in India. They charge director Karan Razdan of creating a "conscious, articulated homophobia" for mass consumption.
Girlfriend is a candyfloss drama about two close women friends who sleep in the same bed and share—explicitly, on screen—a single sexual encounter. When one of them later falls in love with a man, the other becomes consumed by a psychopathic jealousy that leads to a sexual obsession.
In its first week several screenings of the film were disrupted by the fringe Hindu protestors, some of whom also burned effigies of the film’s director. A dozen of them were arrested for breaking windows and ransacking a cinema in the central Indian town of Indore. One protestor even threatened immolation if the film continued to be screened. Police officers, fearing similar attacks, are now guarding other cinemas across the country.
Lesbianism is a rare theme for Bollywood, the Hindi-language film industry based in Mumbai, India. Girlfriend, starring Isha Koppikar and Amrita Arora, has set anger aflame by situating what is often regarded as decadent Western sexual morals on the Bollywood silver screen.
Indian actresses typically don't want to lose their conservative fans, nor do they want to endure salacious flak from journalists. So they're not too keen on even kissing on-screen, and many proudly trumpet their refusal to do it.
Bollywood starlet Ish Koppikar (left)
Bollywood starlet Isha Koppikar, who plays the traumatized lesbian Tanya, doesn’t mind being known as a sexually-liberated shocker. "It was just another role for me…nothing more, nothing less," she told the Hindustan Times. "I’ve already moved on. Girlfriend is history. If others want to hold on to it and create controversies because it suits their purpose, they are welcome to their moment of glory. I’ll have none of it."
Razdan, who also has a reputation in India as a shocker, notes that his film passed the federal censor board and pointed out that Girlfriend "hardly has any bare skin."
"The next time I make a movie I will not take it to the censor board," the Times of India quoted Razdan as saying. "I’ll try to get approval from these custodians of morality." He added that it is not up to protestors to decide whether a film should be shown.
"We’re going to push the government to order the deletion of objectionable scenes in the film," Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, the vice-president of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya party, told the Associated Press. "Shots which are against Indian culture should be removed."
Shiv Sena, a Hindu fringe group often referred to as India’s morals brigade, have long charged that western TV shows and films are corrupting Indian minds. They believe Razdan has imported decadent Western morals with his Girlfriend.
"What one does in the bedroom and the bathroom should not be displayed publicly," Arun Pathak, a Shiv Sena leader declared publicly during the protests.
Despite the physical attacks from fringe Hindus, the more vitriolic attacks have come from gay and lesbian groups who say Girlfriend is a warped and negative portrayal of lesbianism.
Koppikar begs to differ. "Though some of my close friends are gay," she admitted to the Hindustan Times, "I knew nothing about how they think or behave. So I had to work very hard on getting the body language and attitude right. Which I did… I’ve worked so hard on being convincing as a butch that now I’m afraid men will be scared away."
Mumbai’s Humjinsi thinks not. In an hysterical denunciation published in Outlook India magazine, the lesbian activist group characterizes Koppikar’s role as a "sexually abused, violent, obsessive killer, psychopath lesbian," and scores the film as "homophobic" and "hetero-patriarchal."
"The movie tears away the anonymity of lesbian existence," the denunciation goes on to say. "The word lesbian is actually used in the film and the image created is a ghastly and revolting one."
Chatura, head of the Pune-based Organized Lesbian Alliance for Visibility and Action (OLAVA), called Girlfriend "a cheap and titillation-oriented film masquerading as one that’s liberal." The single-name lesbian activist claims that the film "reinforces all the negative stereotypes about lesbian and bisexual women."
Gay activist Ashok Row Kavi went one step further. He accused Razdan of "demonizing" lesbians. "The film takes our sexual identities and makes a joke of them," he said.
In an open letter to the director, activist Tejal Shah wrote that he feared the "homophobic" film would be a major setback for the decades-long campaign by gay rights activists in India.
In sum, these critics object to Razdan’s film for portraying lesbianism as "unnatural"—as "abnormal…people who must die at the end of the film, so that they are aptly punished for their unnatural existence."
What bothers Shah and other gay and lesbian activists is that (in Shah’s words) "values of heterosexual love, marriage and normal families" are upheld in the end.
It is highly ironic that while Shah criticizes Razdan’s depiction of Koppikar’s character as an obsessive psychopath, his own language could be construed as "obsessive":
"Every time I hear of another lesbian suicide, another girl who hanged herself for being teased…I will think of this film and I will be reminded of the power that Bollywood wields in creating a mass consciousness of one sort or the other. In this case, it will be a conscious, articulated, homophobia."
Shah concludes with a memorable and censorious remark: "It’s time that we stopped separating the issues that films address and their impact on the audience/citizen within a given socio-political context/environment. It is also high time that we stand in protest against any film that causes damage to the rights of any minority group."
Ironically, the activist protestors also condemn the Hindu fundamentalists for their own protestations, seemingly unable to recognize that they too believe that it’s time to stop separating the issues addressed in films and their impact on viewing audiences. While the gay and lesbian activists are concerned with the film’s effects on the lesbian subculture in India, the fringe Hindus are concerned with the film’s effect on public morals in traditional Indian culture.
Despite Razdan’s obvious contempt for the fundamentalist protestors and shock at the lesbian activists’ shrill objections, the director Razdan has said the debate his film has provoked is ‘healthy’ for India. In an interview with BBC Radio, Razdan said he is pleased. "Now obviously it’s all out in the open, and people are talking about it. I think that is healthy."
It’s healthy at least for Razdan’s pocketbook. The film’s popularity has skyrocketed since the protests. Indians are reportedly thronging the cinemas before the film gets yanked. It is instructive to note that prior to the protests film critics panned Girlfriend as a C-grade movie "redolent with cliches." Given the unrest provoked by the film, Razdan believes that Girlfriend will now finds its way into cinemas in the United States and Britain.
Michael S. Rose is the author a several books including the New York Times bestseller Goodbye, Good Men. He is Executive Editor of Cruxnews.com.
Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list
Holy smoke that woman on the right is HOT.
The cancer spreads.
Welcome to our world.
That's a wrap!
Censorship is BAD. I'm no fan of the gay-lesbian lifestyle but if someone wants to make or view a film about it, that's their right.
"We’re going to push the government to order the deletion of objectionable scenes in the film," Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, the vice-president of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya party, told the Associated Press. "Shots which are against Indian culture should be removed."The Bharatiya party is IIRC the same as the BJP, recently voted out of power.Shiv Sena, a Hindu fringe group often referred to as India’s morals brigade, have long charged that western TV shows and films are corrupting Indian minds. They believe Razdan has imported decadent Western morals with his Girlfriend.
This goes to show that the problems associated with religion are typically caused by fanatics and not endemic to any specific faith.
-Eric
These are real life lesbians:
And they don't even look Cherokee
Actually, I believe the term is holy cow when involving India and yes she is, the one on the left is not bad either. As my dad would say "I would kick either out bed for eating crackers".
There are open butt cowboy and rug muncher groups in India? Things are worse than I thought.
Somehow I thought India was still a place where that wouldn't be allowed.
Technicly that should be "...for eating popadums."
Trashy films international.
"Censorship is BAD."
No, censorship of political speech is bad.
Censorship of salacious conduct isn't even related to that, and it is GOOD.
Sorry, I'm with the window breakers and poster tearers. Done some of the latter myself.
Because it is unpopular, and won't sell tickets. What kind of moron do you have to be to try and sell an offensive product to people that actively dislike it?
I don't know about Indian lesbian flicks, but the last time I ate at an Indian restaurant, I nearly went crazy from the music videos that were playing constantly. Holy cow (no offense intended), the prisoners at Abu Ghraib don't even begin to know what torture is until they've listened to that stuff.
That's true, the general population won't buy tickets (at least until they become corrupted).
My wife says that when she grew up in Bombay most people had never even heard of lesbianism.
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