March 2015 – Bitch Flicks

‘Waterworld’: Where We Were with Gender 20 Years Ago

In 1995, Waterworld was known for being stupid, stupidly expensive, and the first in a series of bad decisions that hurt Kevin Costner’s career — its reputation hasn’t changed a lot since then. Still, if I’m honest with you, the movie didn’t bother me that much when I was 11. Watching it again this past weekend, I wasn’t exactly shocked to find my perceptions had changed, but I was interested to see where Waterworld falls in the history of popular culture – including popular notions of gender. The movie isn’t as good as you’d hope – in fact, in many ways, it’s really, really bad – but it represents an important phase in how we understood ourselves as men and women.

For those of you who’ve blocked it out, Waterworld is a post-apocalyptic action-adventure movie about a future where the polar icecaps have melted, and humanity lives aboard boats, rafts, and makeshift floating cities. Dirt has become a form of currency, and people preserve fresh, drinkable water at all costs. In the midst of this open sea nightmare, Kevin Costner (whose character doesn’t have a name) is a mutant drifter who lives on the margins, salvaging, trading, and doing battle with pirates, all while looking bad-ass on his boat. Jeanne Tripplehorn is Helen, a shopkeeper on one of the floating cities, who’s adopted a girl named Enola – played by a 10-year-old Tina Majorino.

Enola has a map on her back that no one can interpret, which might show the way to dry land. When a group of pirates hears about it, they attack the floating city to kidnap her, and Helen makes a deal with Kevin Costner to save all their lives. The three of them travel together for most of the movie, facing random dangers on the sea, before they finally have a big showdown with the pirates.

From a critical perspective, Waterworld is both not as bad as we remember it, and worse than we remember it – suffering most from an inconsistent tone. The pirates are like something out of a Saturday morning cartoon, and everything that’s not the pirates is much more serious and grim than the movie seems to think it is. Judging Waterworld by the standards of ‘90s action-adventure movies, where were pretty broad in terms of character and plot, the first act is really promising. The plot points fall like dominoes to get Kevin Costner, Helen, and Enola on the ship together – there’s genuine tension, and all three characters are interesting.

From the vantage point of 2015, it would be easy to criticize the movie for its lack of subtlety and formulaic plot, but that’s partly because cinema has changed a lot in 20 years. Waterworld was created at a time when mainstream audiences didn’t expect a lot of self-referential humour or genre-subverting plot twists. Part of the reason we have so much of that now is because we first had a long stretch of films that were simple and earnest, and collectively established the genre conventions in the first place. It’s not that Waterworld’s doing anything so great and interesting – it’s just that, in terms of plot development, it’s more in the middle of the pack for 1995.

It’s also in the middle of the pack in terms of how gender’s portrayed, and that makes it an interesting snapshot of where were just 20 years ago – both in terms of how far Waterworld is from the movies that came out before, and how far it is from the movies coming out now. From the perspective of gender analysis, the most important part of the movie is the slow-moving part in the middle, where the story’s just about three people on a boat, and how they relate to each other.

Like many female leads of the ’90s, Helen is required to be capable, but not so capable that the man in her life can’t outdo her. She’s also required to be outspoken, as long as no one has to listen when she talks. In the movie’s first act, Helen breaks Kevin Costner out of a cage when the elders in her village try to murder him for being a mutant outsider. She and Enola see that he’s their opportunity to leave the city, and the three of them work together to open the gates and escape in his boat.

As soon as they’re on the boat, though, the story takes an ugly and confusing turn. Kevin Costner first wants to pitch Enola overboard because she’ll use up his resources and, although he lets both of them stay in the end, he’s completely fucking horrible for over half the movie, and it’s not clear how aware the movie is that that’s the case. The movie doesn’t seem to think it’s right for him to act like such an asshole, but it seems to think that this is understandable behaviour, and, sometimes, that it kind of makes him cool. Among the violent, hateful things Kevin Costner does:

He actually does throw Enola overboard, though we’re supposed to forgive him because he changes his mind and goes back for her
He cracks Helen in the head with a paddle, nearly knocking her unconscious, but her body is under a sail so we don’t have to see how brutal it is
He pimps Helen out to an obviously unbalanced creepball they meet on the sea, over her repeated objections – again, we’re supposed to forgive him because he changes his mind

In one of the most disturbing scenes, Helen damages the ship’s harpoon by using it to fight off pirates (and she manages to screw up fighting pirates so that Kevin Costner can look like the hero). Kevin Costner decides – and the film seems to agree with him – that he has the right to punish her for this by swinging a machete at her head and cutting off her hair. Enola speaks up to tell him he’s being an asshole, at which point he notices that she’s been using his crayons after he told her not to. We cut to shot where we see that Helen and Enola have now both lost their hair, and they sheepishly move out of Kevin Costner’s way when he walks by, and stop talking so they don’t annoy him. The movie doesn’t show us Kevin Costner swinging a machete at a terrified 10-year-old girl, and it seems to want us to think it’s funny that he’s restored order on the boat by getting the women to shut the hell up and stay out of his way.

Helen represents a new kind of fantasy woman, popular in the late ’80s and ’90s – one who’s ballsy and opinionated, but can absolutely, 100 percent, still be controlled. In fact, the only reason Helen’s “safe” for mainstream audiences in 1995 is that Kevin Costner’s total dominance over her is constantly reinforced. First, they butt heads in a series of conflicts he always easily wins, and then, once she starts to fall in love with him, they stop butting heads about anything, and she drops back to follow his lead. The message is basically that, if he can learn to be nicer to her, she can acknowledge that he’s her superior.

Helen is a step up from the days when the ideal woman was silent, empty-headed, and dependent, but she still exists mostly as an artefact of male fantasy. She’s fiery at first, because the man of 1995 could find that sexy. And, even though she stands up to the pirates, she’s ultimately submissive for the right kind of guy, because the man of 1995 found that non-threatening. What we see in Waterworld is a snapshot of American culture’s evolving idea of women, at a stage when we were trying to convince ourselves that feminism was compatible with all of the existing power structures patriarchy built, if we could just find the right way to look at it. We no longer believed that men had the right to control women, ipso facto, no matter what – but we still seemed to believe that men could earn the right to control certain women, by meeting vaguely defined obligations toward them. Because Kevin Costner ultimately protects Helen and Enola from other men, and overcomes his natural urge to murder them himself, he earns the right to be the boss in their relationship. It’s maybe half a step back from where we are now, and one step forward from when we were chattel.

Aside from the predictably horrible stuff about women, Waterworld is also interesting because of the snapshot it gives us of maleness. Kevin Costner’s character is antiquated by today’s standards – a type of hyper-competent manly man we don’t believe exists anymore, outside of adolescent fantasy. He’s good at everything he does, he kills people, he has a cool boat, he’s stoic, he’s wise, he gets the best of anyone who tries to screw him over – he’s such a badass that, when he goes fishing, he lets a sea monster swallow him whole so he can kill it from the inside.

He’s basically a cowboy who drinks his own piss.

At the same time, there’s a sense of vulnerability to character, because he hasn’t chosen to be an outsider. He’s an outcast because he’s a mutant, ashamed of his gills and webbed feet, forced to hide them for fear of being discovered. The movie strongly implies that the reason he’s mean isn’t just because it’s neat to be an asshole, or because he’s privy to some deep truth about the harsh realities of life – it’s partly because he’s lonely and he needs to learn how to connect with other people. In fact, the entire arc of his character development – such as it is – is that he learns to be less selfish, and becomes attached enough to Helen and Enola that he’ll risk his life and lose his boat to save them.

In the narrative of 1995, male leads still need to prove they’re capable of doing all the bad-ass things that men are supposed to be able to do. They still have to show that they don’t want to be all sissified, and caring, and interested in having conversations – they don’t want to hang around with women all the time, they don’t want to talk about their feelings, they don’t want to be all lame and interested in things like friendship when they could just swing machetes at your face – but then, somehow, somewhat against their will, they gradually start to have some vulnerable emotions and, as long as they keep blowing up the pirate ships, it’s still OK.

This doesn’t seem like a big deal by today’s standards, where male leads are often awkward, average, bumbling guys who get by with the help of their friends, but, in terms of action-adventure movie standards, having a hero who expressed self-doubt, loneliness, or insecurity was a step toward acknowledging that men have feelings, too.

The scene in Waterworld that’s maybe most instructive about how the movie sees both men and women, and the dynamics of relationships between them, is the scene just as we enter act two. Kevin Costner says he wants to toss Enola overboard, and Helen offers to have sex with him if she and Enola can stay. There’s a wide shot of the deck as she takes off her dress, and then there’s a long, silent moment where the actors communicate a lot of information through their expressions. It’s clear that Helen doesn’t want to sleep with Kevin Costner – that this is a horrible sacrifice she’s making to keep Enola safe, and it’s basically the worst day of her life. Kevin Costner is, at first, tempted by her offer, because he’s lonely, but, when he reads the disgust in her face, he backs off – maybe because he thinks she’s disgusted by his being a mutant, maybe because he doesn’t want to have sex with someone who isn’t into it, no matter what the reason – we don’t know. When she asks him later why he didn’t do it, his answer is the equally unreadable, “Because you didn’t want me.”

Waterworld is a movie that understands that women don’t actually want to have sex random dudes just because they are the heroes of the movie. It understands that, when women offer to trade sex for something, it’s usually not because they feel great about the deal. It understands that it would be wrong for Kevin Costner to accept the trade. At the same time, it’s a movie that wants to show us Jeanne Tripplehorn’s butt when she takes off her dress, and make sure we know that Kevin Costner totally could have done it with her if he wasn’t such a stand-up guy. Just like to totally could have murdered that kid, and totally could have pimped out his lady friend, also if he wasn’t such a stand-up, awesome guy.

It’s a vision of a world where men can still have the power to do whatever they want to to women, but where they sometimes shouldn’t – where, in fact, they are princely, amazing, good guys if they don’t. It’s a world where you should try to be nice to the people in a one-down position from you, as long as they aren’t climbing up.

Also, it’s a world where any random rope can be a bungee cord, and I don’t understand that part quite as well.

Katherine Murray is a Toronto-based writer who yells about movies and TV on her blog.

True Beauty in ‘A Day in Eden’

This moment, of course, is true beauty. They are vulnerable with one another, and that erases the walls that we constantly build up between generations, religions, and genders.

Written by Leigh Kolb.

“What is beauty?”
“I have a thousand brilliant lies for the question.”

Assal Ghawami’s short film, A Day in Eden, quietly reflects upon the question of beauty. The first images we see in the film are in a nursing home–an elderly man in a wheelchair, a nurse roughly scrubbing a resident. The workers seem harsh, and the residents seem disconnected. All this unfolds as the narrator asks, “What is beauty?”

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6gDCer30wc”]

A volunteer cellist, Fereshde (Briana Marin), who is unmistakably conventionally beautiful, is led into the room of Mr. Hammacher (Stewart Steinberg). The nurse tells Fereshde that he has no friends or family. Fereshde, in her headscarf, sits and takes out her cello to play for him. There is a crucifix hanging above his bed. The contrast of youth and beauty and age and decay is clear in every shot. But the concept of “beauty” is much deeper than the skin.

A Day in Eden: the contrast of the headscarf and crucifix — *A Day in Eden*: the contrast of the headscarf and crucifix

Mr. Hammacher is angry and combative, but finds himself in an incredibly vulnerable position (even more so than before) when he soils himself. “Please don’t tell,” he says to Fereshde. “I just want to go home.” They embrace, and she gently, with great care and compassion, changes his pants. “It’s OK,” she says.

This moment, of course, is true beauty. They are vulnerable with one another, and that erases the walls that we constantly build up between generations, religions, and genders.

While she was making the film, Ghawami wrote about her work advocating for the Elder Justice Act (which became law in 2010). She said,

“To help pass this piece of legislation I produced and edited more than 50 interviews with victims of elderly abuse that were presented to Congress in 2010. I hope that A Day in Eden will continue to shed light on the issue of elder abuse and inspire more people to fight for the rights of our elders.”

On its surface, A Day in Eden is not overtly an activist film. The residents seem neglected and the workers seem cold, and we need to question how normal that seems. The deep humanity with which Fereshde treats Mr. Hammacher transforms him. Ghawami’s message is clear, then: only through compassionate humanity can we heal and be healed.

A Day in Eden is beautiful not only in its message, but also in its cinematography, editing, soundtrack, and acting. Beauty can be defined in a thousand different subjective ways. But A Day in Eden’s beauty lies in its truth.

Visit http://www.assalghawami.com/ for the director’s reel and upcoming screenings.

See also at Bitch Flicks: The Yellow Room and the Timeless Locking Up of Women’s Experiences

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature, and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri.

#Filmherstory: Six Royals Objectively Cooler Than Another Bloody Henry 8th

In honor of Henry’s wives and the #filmherstory campaign, here are six Royal women overdue the Hollywood treatment. To help with your visualizing, I’ll even toss in a pitch, director, and star.

Damian Lewis smirks at me from a magazine rack under the caption “Damian Lewis Makes Henry VIII Sexy!” Déjà vu. Clearly, I’m missing the exciting difference between Wolf Hall‘s sinister-but-sexy Henry VIII and Eric Bana’s sinister-but-sexy Henry VIII in The Other Boleyn Girl, which rewrote Jonathan Rhys Meyers’ sinister-but-sexy Henry VIII in Fifty Shades of Tudors (OK, OK, Natalie Dormer did rock), which updated Richard Burton’s sinister-but-sexy Henry VIII in Anne of the Thousand Days, which critics agree was sexier than Charles Laughton’s Oscar-winning sinister-but-lovable Henry VIII in The Private Life of Henry VIII. It would be easy to make this a feminist issue, considering that chronic womanizer Henry VIII executed two wives for infidelity, despite having won the right to divorce them. However, 18 actresses have immortalized Queen Elizabeth I on screen, earning Oscar nominations for portraying the woman who presided over campaigns of religious persecution and expansive colonization as heroic, or sinister-but-lovable at worst.

Nowadays, we theoretically agree that colonialism was a bad idea. Our conquering heroes have become conquering antiheroes. Yet antiheroes actually command empathy as effectively as heroes. A study by Chippewa researcher JoEllen Shively found that 60 percent of her Sioux focus group, viewing Western The Searchers, identified with John Wayne’s viciously racist (and misogynist) Ethan Edwards. While conflicted, “half breed” sidekick Martin Pawley is cited as evidence that the film is “morally complex,” according to Shively, “the Indians, like the Anglos, identified with the characters that the narrative structure tells them to identify with.” Tokens represent no-one, only their author’s urge to appear liberal, while vicariously identifying with conquerors. Meanwhile, today’s White Saviors admirably rescue natives from evil colonizers, thereby ironically reinforcing the colonialist assumption that white heroes should control the destinies of the colonized.

Women of the Third and Fourth World are doubly marginalized; they are the damsels-in-distress for the natives-in-distress for the White Savior: #filmheranticolonialstory. Here in Ireland, our anticolonial icons remain unfilmed, apart from Irish director Neil Jordan’s Michael Collins, but entry to the EU Colonizer’s Club has entitled our Mr. Rhys Meyers to play colonial icon Henry VIII (progress!). So, while I would love to see Fiona Shaw as Pirate Queen Grace O’Malley, storming fortresses and sailing to London to confront Elizabeth I (thereby nailing the elusive Royal Bechdel), it matters more to invite audiences to identify with female leaders of the Third and Fourth Worlds. In honor of Henry’s wives and the #filmherstory campaign, here are six Royal women overdue the Hollywood treatment. To help with your visualizing, I’ll even toss in a pitch, director, and star.

Ava DuVernay’s Nzinga

The plot: Queen Nzinga Mbande fought and maneuvered in 17th century Angola. Serving as diplomatic envoy for her brother, Ndongo’s King, Nzinga personally negotiated a peace treaty with Portugal, sitting on a willing follower when denied an equal seat by their governor. Taking the throne in 1626, Nzinga forged alliances with African neighbors and Portugal’s Dutch rivals, scoring a victory against the Portuguese at the 1647 Battle of Kombi, and personally leading troops in battle until the age of 60. Building her base, Matamba, as a strategic trading port, the abolitionist Queen resisted the Atlantic slave trade and foreign rule throughout her lifetime, dying peacefully in 1663.

The pitch: Elizabeth: The Golden Age in Africa.

The star: Lupita Nyong’o is an internationally celebrated African star, noted for her regal style on the red carpet as well as her Oscar-winning acting. Playing an actual queen is the logical next step.

The director: Ava DuVernay’s Selma shows she can find interesting humanity in inspirational icons. In her hands, Nzinga could be a pragmatic political player, juggling conflicting alliances, more than a romantic ideal, and shed light on African colonial history from a fresh angle.

Ang Lee’s Cixi

The plot: Chinese historian Jung Chang‘s biography of Empress Dowager Cixi highlights her role in industrializing the country, opposing foreign rule, banning torture and foot-binding, educating women, establishing a free press and initiating China’s transition to parliamentary democracy. This semi-literate concubine forged a stable alliance with the Emperor’s wife (another Royal Bechdel), loved and lost a palace eunuch, whose execution was ordered by her own brother-in-law, faced down continual threats to her power and was driven by European encroachments to back the devastating Boxer rebellion. Not forgetting a Japanese invasion, a rebellious Emperor’s gay love affairs and Cixi’s final decision to prevent her reactionary adopted son from undoing her reforms by poisoning him. Drama!

The pitch: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon meets The Last Emperor.

The star: Michelle Yeoh should be in everything. From her delicate portrait of repressed longing in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to her commanding turn in The Lady, Yeoh is the natural choice.

The director: With a heroine forced by convention to rule from behind a silk screen, this demands a director like Taiwan’s Ang Lee, who can make gripping drama out of restraint.

Deepa Mehta’s Lakshmibai

The plot: Though Rani (Queen) Lakshmibai was the heroine of India’s first technicolor epic, 1956’s Jhansi Ki Rani, she deserves Hollywood stardom and a grittier reboot. After her Maharajah husband died, Lakshmibai’s claim to rule, as regent for her adopted son, was denied by the British East India Company to justify their annexation of her state, Jhansi. Learning martial arts in childhood, Lakshmibai became a major leader of the 1857 Indian Rebellion, training women to fight in her ranks. Her role in a mutiny that massacred British forces at Jhansi’s fort remains unclear. Fighting off invasions by two neighboring rajas, her city finally fell to British heavy artillery. Lakshmibai fled in male disguise with her infant son, joined the rebel army of Tatya Tope and died fighting in the battle of Gwalior.

The pitch: Ashoka the Great meets Braveheart. For girls.

The star: Shriya Saran, who played Parvati in Mehta’s Midnight Children, showed the determination to prepare for her role by working for two months in Mumbai’s slums, and has an athletic body trained in Kathak and Rajasthani dance, with the striking beauty that even her British enemies admired in Lakshmibai.

The director: Deepa Mehta has tackled epic narratives of India’s Partition in Earth, taboo sexuality in Fire, the cruel treatment of widows in Water, and the diaspora experience in Heaven on Earth, but never explored British colonial rule. Like Sam Mendes directing Skyfall, putting Mehta in charge of an action epic could bring psychological depth to its high-octane clashes. Lakshmibai is so iconic in India that she is almost saintly, but Mehta has the guts to give her human flaws and delve into the brutal dilemmas of warfare.

Shonda Rhimes’ Ranavalona

The plot: “I will rule here, to the good fortune of my people and the glory of my name!” Ranavalona I has been labelled the “Mad Queen of Madagascar” for overseeing religious persecutions, inquisitions under torture and sweeping purges of political enemies, just like sinister-but-supposedly-sexily-sane Henry VIII. Rising from a commoner’s background, marrying the king and seizing absolute power on his death in a masterful coup, Ranavalona murdered the father of her child for his infidelity (*cough* Henry VIII), and harnessed French lover Jean Laborde to oversee Madagascar’s industrial revolution. Her later years were marked by excess, with numerous Malagasy dying to construct a road for her buffalo hunt, but Ranavalona foiled all plots to overthrow her (including ex-lover Laborde’s) and kept Madagascar free from colonial rule. There was method in her madness.

The pitch: The Tudors meets Shaka Zulu. For girls.

The star: Angela Bassett’s Emmy-nominated voodoo queen, Marie Laveau in American Horror Story: Coven, shows she can be commanding, scary and sympathetic in turn. Ranavalona is the role she was born for.

The showrunner: Ranavalona’s journey to the dark side deserves a Tudors-style series to fully develop. In Scandal and How To Get Away With Murder, Shonda Rhimes has proved that she relishes antiheroines and moral ambiguity. Ranavalona would take Rhimes into the lush historical epic, too long monopolized by white royalty.

Steve McQueen’s Nanye-hi

The plot: After snatching the rifle of her dead husband and rallying Cherokee warriors against their Creek rivals to win the 1755 Battle of Taliwa, Nanye-hi was elected Ghighau (Beloved Woman), heading the Women’s Council and sitting on the Council of Chiefs (OK, the Cherokee were too advanced to technically have royalty, cut me a break). Nanye-hi, also called “Nancy Ward” after marrying settler Bryant Ward, was a political moderate juggling extreme pressures, alerting settlers to Cherokee plans for a massacre, saving a white woman from burning at the stake and personally negotiating the peace treaty of 1781, but strongly opposing the sale of Cherokee lands and petitioning against plans for removal, which would culminate in the Trail of Tears after her death. Nanye-hi would showcase Indigenous traditions of “petticoat government” that inspired the first suffragettes, within a tense drama of compromise and resistance.

The pitch: Princess Kaiulani meets Borgen.

The star: If you’ve seen her powerful performance in Blackstone (lucky American readers can catch up on hulu), you know Michelle Thrush should be in everything that does not already star Michelle Yeoh (actually, I just had a great idea for a buddy cop movie). She’s a natural choice to capture the strain of Nanye-hi’s political conflicts.

The director: I haven’t yet seen Georgina Lightning’s Older Than America, so I can’t suggest any Native American women to direct. However, Steve McQueen’s treatment of the Irish Troubles in Hunger, and American slavery in 12 Years A Slave, prove the British director is unafraid to tackle controversial history with an outsider’s fresh eye. Lupita Nyong’o’s Oscar, for her first major film role, also shows his talent at coaxing raw performances from his actresses. Disney’s Pocahontas this would not be.

Timur Bekmambetov’s Khutulun

The plot: Mongols were pretty imperial, what with the largest land empire in history. But Central Asia’s absorption into the Russian/Soviet sphere has made it invisible, with Sacha Baron Cohen selecting Kazakhstan for Borat because “it was a country that no one had heard anything about” despite being the ninth largest in the world and launching the first man into space. Played by the physically slight Korean actress Claudia Kim, as a supporting character in Netflix’s Marco Polo, champion wrestler Khutulun deserves solo stardom. Excelling in battles against the armies of her cousin Kublai Khan, this Mongolian princess demanded that suitors beat her in wrestling, or forfeit 100 horses. She acquired 10,000 horses before making a politically strategic match of her own choosing. Nominated for khanship after her father’s death, Khutulun reportedly backed her brother Orus’ bid in exchange for being appointed Commander-in-Chief of his army.

The pitch: Mongol for girls.

The star: Mongol actress Khulan Chuluun was mostly stuck in the love interest role, but showed flashes of stubborn spirit. With a director like Bekmambetov, known for making action heroes of character actors like James McAvoy, could she train up and become an icon?

The director: Kazak director Bekmambetov’s talent for tongue-in-cheek, inventive action would be perfect for the unbelievable legends that have grown up around Khutulun. Witness his wild portrait of his namesake, Central Asian conqueror Tamerlane (Timur) in the opening of Day Watch. He’s also a great director of women, from Galina Tyunina’s scene-stealing Olga to Angelina Jolie’s tough-but-fair Fox in Wanted. Movie, please.

So, who would be your historical (anti)heroines? For the Soska Sisters to realize their dream to film Bathory? Michelle Rodriguez in Robert Rodriguez’s Malinche, as a punk survivor of sex trafficking who wants to watch the world burn? Gong Li as Zhang Yimou’s Wu Zetian? Kerry Washington in Fanta Régina Nacro’s Mama Yaa Asentewaa? Saoirse Ronan as a young Countess Markievicz for Juanita Wilson? Iman as Hatshepsut? Join the conversation – #filmherstory.

Brigit McCone writes and directs short films and radio dramas. Her hobbies include doodling and memorizing lists of forgotten female leaders (Brigit McCone is an extremely dull conversationalist).

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

For White TV Writers Who Have Considered Racism When *Ethnic* Diversity Is Too Much by Jai Tiggett at Shadow and Act

Critics are Pissed That People of Color are Finally Being Represented in Media by Sesali B. at Feministing

At the Box Office, It’s No Longer a Man’s World by Brooks Barnes at The New York Times

Hollywood’s Women Problem: Why Female Filmmakers Have Hit the Glass Ceiling by Gili Malinsky at The Daily Beast

What DreamWorks movie ‘Home’ means for Hollywood representation by Alexandra Samuels at USA Today

New Web Series “You’re So Talented” Gives Us a Black Female Protagonist to Root For by Evette Dionne at Bitch Media

Two New Films About Girls – One a Dystopian Sci-Fi, the Other a Gritty Indie – Announced by Inkoo Kang at Women and Hollywood

Agent Scully is Back! by Sarah Mirk at Bitch Media

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Whispers of a House Mouse: Attempting to Disrupt ‘Cinderella’ in 2015

Written by Colleen Clemens.

I took my daughter to see Kenneth Branagh’s live action Cinderella over the weekend, even though before my daughter was born, I swore there would be no princesses.

We knew she was a girl early on but, much to the consternation of those around us, didn’t share the news. I wanted to avoid the “pink tide” for as long as possible. We have a strict “No Barbie” policy in the house. I teach Gender Studies; I rail against the princesses during class hours. But my home isn’t a feminist utopia. My daughter made bracelets instead of bridges with her Goldie Blocks. At this point in her life, she is more interested in accessorizing than engineering.

I was parenting solo that weekend. I had a cold and was exhausted. The movie was cheap, the popcorn and soda for dinner even cheaper. I told myself it was a material issue, that it was a feminist act that I chose my sanity, the promise of her being still and entertained for a few hours worth the exposure to blond, white princesses. And there was the Frozen short we were both curious to see.

In the end, I liked the movie. But I didn’t love that I took her. Because I worry that some of the images from the film—as much as I tried to disrupt them—will stick with her. I can think of three specific examples.

First, the waists. I had been so worried about the whiteness, the blondeness, the general thinness, that I forgot to think about the waists, but during my viewing, all I could do was stare at Lily James and Cate Blanchett’s waists. I hadn’t read all of the pre-film hype about the issue, that James had eschewed solid food for days on end to fit her already slim waist into the corset. During the movie, my mind raced: Will my daughter think this size is normal, even though she often pulls up my shirt to look at my very normal belly to press my belly button? Will she start comparing my stomach to Cinderella’s? I kept wondering: Can film editors do the same tricks that print editors do? Is there some kind of filmic Photoshopping happening? (They swear there is no digital magic happening.) The waists are something to behold and left me trembling. Meanwhile, my daughter housed a large popcorn without a care in the world. But how long will it be before she starts to make connections between food and body shame, even if I do all I can to disrupt it?

Second, the love story. The idea that all stories work toward a heterosexual coupling is a myth we work toward disrupting in our household, for both familial and political reasons. We have lots of conversations about what love can look like for her and for those around us. So I wasn’t too upset when she insisted she needed to go to the bathroom at the moment Cinderella and Kit come together to declare their love. However, the line at the loo foiled my plan. As we stood at the back of the theater and watched the two come together, I whispered in her ear: “Remember, this movie is about a boy and a girl in love. And there are lots of other ways to love. But this movie right now is about a boy and a girl.” I can whisper in her ear all I want. Until she actually sees a romance that goes beyond the one trope we all know, these whispers may fall on deaf ears.

Third, the desperation. The shenanigans that the women of the kingdom enact to jam their feet into the glass slipper are hysterical. I laughed. Especially at the wicked stepsisters and their desperation to get…that…foot…into…that…shoe.

However, just as with the rest of the movie, I also felt an anxiety about those scenes as I felt the weight of my daughter, sitting on my knee at this point in the movie. If the goal to be attained is the love of a wealthy man in just about every film marketed to her, and if her initiation into girlhood isn’t going to be completely mediated by me (though how I wish that were possible), what are my choices? I can whisper in her ear that marriage isn’t everything, that waists aren’t that tiny, that love looks like many things, but aren’t the shouts of Disney in this world louder than my whispers in her ear?

I may only be as loud as the mice that flit about Cinderella’s feet.

Colleen Lutz Clemens is assistant professor of non-Western literatures at Kutztown University. She blogs about gender issues and postcolonial theory and literature at http://kupoco.wordpress.com/. When she isn’t reading, writing, or grading, she is wrangling her two-year old daughter, two dogs, and on occasion her partner.

Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture: The Roundup

Check out all of the posts for our Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture Theme Week here.

The Social Network and the China Doll/Dragon Lady Syndrome by Stephanie Charamnac

Part Dragon Lady, part China Doll, Christy is 100 percent stereotypical. It’s hard to believe that such a distorted representation, steeped in age-old myths, only dates back to 2010. Even more disheartening is the fact that most film critics did not raise an eyebrow at this deeply flawed portrayal.

Fresh Off the Boat’s Jessica Huang Is Loud, Abrasive, Intense, and Exactly What We Need by Deborah Pless

I don’t want to jump the gun here, since the show has only been on now for a month and a half, but Jessica Huang might just be my new favorite female character. Why? Because she is hilarious, brilliant, incredibly sarcastic, and because she refuses to let anyone get away with anything. Basically, because I see myself in her and I love it. What can I say? I’m naturally egotistical.

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai: Bollywood Hurts Men, Too by Brigit McCone

By supplying excuses all around, Kuch Kuch Hota Hai upholds the status quo while venting its resulting frustrations; the performances lovingly celebrate female feistiness, while the plot constantly punishes and suppresses it in favor of traditional ideals of self-sacrifice and emotional martyrdom. Cue predictable feminist outrage. You already know everything I would write. So instead, I’d like to focus on another aspect of the film: its utter contempt for male agency. Yes, male.

Kalinda Sharma Is My Favorite Queer Uncanny Star by Rosie Kar

Though based in downtown Chicago, there is a paucity of people of color in the show, and those who do make appearances seem to be present for only short amounts of time, save for one: Kalinda Sharma. She is an independent private investigator for the firm Lockhart and Gardner, and is a supporting character in the series’ narrative. Played by actress Archie Panjabi, the role of Kalinda Sharma is one that is groundbreaking in terms of thinking about queer South Asian bodies onscreen in the American imaginary.

The World Before Her: Between Liberalization and Fundamentalism–India’s Two Faces by Asma Sayed

Pahuja sees the film as going beyond the issues of women’s rights; according to her, the film is about India, and what’s happening there, and the fear about the future as the culture of the country goes through extreme changes. She adds that, through the film, she would like to showcase the kind of “hatred being taught in the camps in the guise of patriotism.”

Ouran High School Host Club: Haruhi, Heteronormativity, and the Gender Binary by Jackson Adler

At its heart, Ouran is about gender and, for better or worse, how it is perceived and performed. Though often praised and adored for its challenges to heteronormativity and gender roles through its range of characters, especially its protagonist, it ends up reinforcing heteronormativity and the gender binary to a large extent.

Mother India: Woman, Pillar of the Nation by AP

Mother India treats Radha’s abnegating nature as a positive. Look how nobly she suffers for her husband and sons, the movie seems to say. In real life, such glorification of women’s suffering enables an exploitative system of economic growth on the backs of underpaid, overworked women. They get nothing except lip service, sometimes not even that.

Saving Face: About Chinese American Women, Not Based on a Book By Amy Tan by Ren Jender

Like Chutney Popcorn, Saving Face is one of the few films focused on queer people of color and their families. Having those two elements together might seem like a modest achievement, but Pariah is one of the only recent films that also includes both. Mainstream movie makers apparently think queer people of color don’t have families, but instead are deposited as eggs in a sandy, warm spot by a pond until they hatch and make their way, independently, into the world.

Not Everybody Is Kung Fu Fighting by Katie Li

English-Vinglish: Straddling Patriarchal and Linguistic Hegemony by Asma Sayed

Moving away from the Bollywood style masala and dancing-around-the-trees numbers, this film focuses on the real-life issue of the position of women in the domestic and social spheres in India.

Why Fresh Off the Boat Is Kind of a Big Deal by Katy Koop

So, in a world where people think you don’t have to cast Asians to play Asian parts, Fresh Off the Boat gives hope that maybe Asian kids or mixed kids like me will actually see a sitcom and see themselves a little. And maybe if it’s a success, more shows and better casting will follow.

The Kims Next Door: Korean Identity on Gilmore Girls by Elizabeth Kiy

While Rory struggled with the myriad of concerns afforded to a main character: her love life, her future, her friendships and family, Lane’s biggest conflict was always her overbearing, uber-religious mother and to a lesser degree, her own Korean heritage. Being Korean is never posed as a positive thing for Lane, it is only a marker of difference.

The Kims Next Door: Korean Identity on ‘Gilmore Girls’

Written by Elizabeth Kiy as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture.

When Gilmore Girls was on it never occurred to me how strange it was that doe-eyed, bookworm Rory was on odd choice for a main character. Rory always carried a book around in her purse and considered an ideal evening to be watching a movie with her mother and eating her weight in junk food; on any other show she’d be a nerd, but her best friend, Lane Kim was undeniably cool. Lane was in a rock band, Lane was a cheerleader, she had an encyclopedia knowledge of music and later, she lived in a virtual frat-house with her bandmates. But she wasn’t Rory, the town’s baby, the golden girl, Snow White. Lane appeared to be just as smart and well-read as Rory, but no one ever suggested Chilton or Yale could be options for her. Rory and her big blue eyes went off to conquer the world and Lane stayed back in Stars Hollow, a few blocks from where she’d grown up, still in her mother’s sphere of influence.

For most of the show’s run, Rory or her mother Lorelai, would have their A-plot adventures, navigating the strange world of wealth and classism their old money background and Rory’s acceptance to Chilton usher them into, while plots for supporting characters like Lane, Rory’s closest friend (besides her mother) since the first day of preschool, popped up occasionally. While Rory struggled with the myriad of concerns afforded to a main character, her love life, her future, her friendships and family, Lane’s biggest conflict was always her overbearing, uber-religious mother and to a lesser degree, her own Korean heritage.

Being Korean is never posed as a positive thing for Lane (played by Japanese American actress Keiko Agena), it is only a marker of difference. Besides Michel, the flamboyant Celine Dion-loving inn concierge, who is Black, there are no other memorable minority characters in the series besides Lane and her mother. Though she is given her share of witty lines and pop culture references, Lane is the token minority best friend who has quirky hobbies, such as obsessively collecting CDs and hiding music and books her mother wouldn’t approve of under her floorboards. Once, when she believes she is being shipped off to Korea with a giant suitcase and a one-way ticket, the unseen idea of Korea, a far away land full of unknown relatives and unfamiliar culture so different from her American identity, is posed as a punishment and a threat.

In the first few seasons, her major hurdle is her mother’s insistence that she only date nice Korean boys, preferably future doctors. In one episode, she finds herself interested in a Korean boy who attends Chilton with Rory and her attraction to him becomes a minor identity crisis, that she handled by sneaking around and acting as if he was a boy her mother would not approve of. The relationship quickly ended before it had really begun because of Lane’s fixation on her mother’s approval, and her often pointless rebellion against her. In a later plot line, Lane discovered another young Korean boy, who she described to Rory as “the male me”, as he was forced to keep his relationship with a white girl secret from his mother. At the time, Lane was dating a white boy ( Adam Brody , who left Gilmore Girls to make his name in The OC ), they made a deal to pretend they were dating each other.

If Lane is used as a foil to Rory, Lane’s mother, who is only ever referred to as Mrs. Kim (Emily Kuroda), is contrasted with Lorelai. Lorelai is young and fun, while Mrs. Kim is austere and unyielding; if the show’s thesis is that Lorelai’s parenting style, acting as best friends instead of mother and daughter, is successful and enviable, we can only infer we are meant to see Mrs. Kim’s authoritarian parenting as failing her child. Though her character is given several humanizing moments throughout the series’s run, she retains cartoonish characteristics (notably in seven seasons, she is never given a first name), though this is common among the denizens of Stars Hollow. She talks fast and brusque, “barking” out orders in her heavy accent, scaring and dominating other adults, and single handedly controls Lane’s life, like a less ambitious “Tiger Mom.” Her idea of the life Lane can have is small: attend a religious college, marry a Korean doctor and have children. It’s a life not unlike her own.

Though early seasons hint that there is a Mr. Kim living with Lane and her mother, just offscreen, gradually these hints peter out and Mrs. Kim is left in a strange netherland: She mistrusts unmarried women and considers herself to be married, yet she doesn’t seem to be divorced or widowed. Like Lorelai, she is, or at least acts as, a single mother and along with her dominance, this masculinizes her.

Meanwhile Lane is closer to the stereotype of Asian women as submissive. Though she attempts to be rebellious and independent, Lane’s worldview has been shaped by the mother whose shadow she lives in. As Gilmore Girls began with the tension of whether or not Rory would repeat her mother’s mistakes, sex was always loaded territory in the show. Though Rory is able to grow into an outgoing, sex positive woman, thanks to Lorelai’s example, Lane is never able to enjoy sex. She believes her mother has somehow gotten into her head, convincing her subconscious that she had to wait until marriage to have sex, even though her conscious mind has not made this choice. On her wedding day, she learns that Mrs. Kim believes she is lucky because she only “had” to have sex once in her life, which produced Lane. Likewise, Lane becomes pregnant from her first, grossly unsatisfying sexual encounter.

As a friend, Lane is also subservient to Rory, though part of this is the nature of her role as a supporting character. Rarely does she get mad at Rory for going off to a fancy new school, leaving her at Stars Hollow High, frequently referred to as a nowhere school which prepares students only for trades and sales. Lane is forced to live the life Rory would have lived if not for her rich grandparents’ patronage.

Part of Rory’s new life are her countless new friends, classmates roommates and colleagues (mostly notably frenemy cum BFF Paris Geller), who often seem closer to her than Lane. Even if Lane is Rory’s closest friend, Lorelai is always her best friend, the person she cares about and understands better than anyone else. In contrast, Lane only has her music and she accepts this.

Besides being the only non-white character whose background we are given in detail, Mrs. Kim is also the only religious character, thus her Asian-ness is inexplicably tied to her religiousness, as a Seventh Day Adventist. Her church appears to be mainly Korean and Korean food and instruments are major parts of their gatherings. Though religion is a major source of conflict between Lane and Mrs. Kim, it also facilitates an understanding when Mrs. Kim’s mother comes to attend Lane’s wedding. The grandmother is a strict Buddhist who is unaware that her daughter is a Christian, forcing her to hide her bibles and crosses under the same floorboards where Lane hid her music. Lane is finally able to understand her mother though this rebellion, her Christianity becomes as subversive as Lane’s rock and roll.

Though Lane’s Korean identity only ever appears to be a source of discomfort, by the series’ end she seems to have made an offscreen peace with her heritage, as she names one of her twins Kwan.

Elizabeth Kiy is a Canadian writer and journalist living in Toronto, Ontario.

Why ‘Fresh Off the Boat’ Is Kind of a Big Deal

So, in a world where people think you don’t have to cast Asians to play Asian parts, ‘Fresh Off the Boat’ gives hope that maybe Asian kids or mixed kids like me will actually see a sitcom and see themselves a little. And maybe if it’s a success, more shows and better casting will follow.

This guest post by Katy Koop previously appeared at Medium and appears now as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture. Cross-posted with permission.

I am so excited about Fresh Off the Boat. I may only be 3/8ths Burmese, but I’m 100 percent down for a portrayal of an Asian family. As a child I was always a huge fan of shows like My Wife and Kids, The Proud Family, The Family Garcia, or even Ugly Betty–at the time I couldn’t place why I liked them so much more than your standard run of the mill “white people” sitcom and it was because anything that looked moderately diverse, anything that looked moderately like my family was great.

This is my dad’s side of the family (the one with Burmese in it):

I just thought this picture was also relevant to my case.

I have never seen a TV show with as much diversity as every Sunday at my grandma’s house when I was little–straight up. My dream is to pitch a sitcom called “two or more races” or “other” and what honest to goodness mixed-up large families look like. My dad and his brothers and sisters, there were eight of them, so as you can see, there was a lot of opportunity to spread the genes. But that’s not what this article was about–the fact is, I never really had a show where I saw Asians.

Yeah, it rocked my world to see Lucy Liu anywhere, especially as Watson in Elementary, and Ashly Perez from the Buzzfeed video is currently rocking my world, but beyond the prince in the Brandy version of Cinderella being Asian (and to be honest kinda looking like my dad), I didn’t have a lot to satisfy the 3/8ths part of myself that super proud to say, “I’m multiracial so I mark other,” when talking about this new standardized test thing in the third grade. So it’s a really big deal that there are like six whole Asians with lines and characters with real parts–and I know that doesn’t seem like a big deal but it’s a big deal. You wouldn’t think it, but we still live in a world where people don’t think Asians actually have to be played by Asians. Blackface was terrible and I’m glad we live in a place where people (generally) know you can’t dress a white person as a Black person and just use a little makeup and everyone will just be OK with it because they totally earned the part–but that happens all the time for Asians.

Like I know you’re thinking, well it’s not Breakfast at Tiffany’s anymore, people don’t actually do that still.

My sophomore year of high school in auditions for Anything Goes, my drama teacher asked if I could read for the characters Ping or Ling in an “Asian Accent.” I straight up didn’t do it and roles went to an Asian girl, a white guy, and a Black guy.

Two years ago I stage managed a production of The Mikado, and with no Asians in the cast, everyone put on white face paint and did “Asian makeup.” And to be honest I can’t even find that, that amazingly offensive because that’s actually what EVERYONE DOES when they produce that show. It’s a show standard. It’s one of the most popular Gilbert and Sullivans and is done constantly. Here’s an article about a 2014 Seattle production. You can’t argue with people that don’t know they’re doing wrong.

And you might be saying, “Hey, that just sounds like a personal experience,” “Maybe you just live somewhere not quite sensitive to race”–maybe, if it wasn’t just something that happens all the time.

Let’s talk about Batman: Does the name Ra Al Ghul sound like it would be played by someone as German-looking as Liam Neeson?

We meet him in Batman Begins surrounded by unnamed Asians. And then he sprouts up, and surprise–you thought I’d totally be Asian but I was just using all these Asians as a mean to an end (wait what?).

And this isn’t an Asian part but if you’ve seen the commercials for the movie Pan, Rooney Mara is playing the role of Tiger Lily–there were no Native Americans, there was no one, there were no people of color, I guess, obviously?

Even kind of mediocre, the NBC Peter Pan had a woman of color playing Tiger Lily. And the list keeps going–who knows what was going on with all the race bending in Cloud Atlas, Jake Gyllenhaal in Prince of Persia, or the whitewashing travesty that was the live action version of Avatar: the Last Airbender. Not to mention the fact that I’ve seen Avenue Q three times on Broadway and local theater and I have never seen Christmas Day played by an Asian woman–though I did a Google search and I actually see a lot of Asian women in that role so my hope in humanity is restored.

I repeat SIX WHOLE ASIANS GUYS. ASIANS–Fresh Off the Boat IS OUR TIME.

Katy Koop is a recent graduate from Meredith College with degrees in English and Theatre. She currently works at a movie theatre by day and tries to do theatre and get freelance writing jobs by night (also netflix and general internet procrastination by night). She has a website at katykoop.com and can be found trying to be funny or trying desperately to get advice from celebrities on twitter with the handle @katykooped.

Not Everybody Is Kung Fu Fighting

This guest post by Katie Li appears as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture.

“So, do you know kung fu?”

This question is the scourge of Asian-America. The assumption that we all know martial arts is one of the handful of stereotypes that pop culture has been mainlining to the masses, leaving individuals to challenge these overly-simplified notions of Asian identity: the China Doll, the Dragon Lady, the Laundry Man, the Kung Fu Hero. We’ve been fighting against these stereotypes for decades—and Hollywood isn’t helping.

This question—like all stereotypes—is born out of unchallenged ignorance. As frustrating as it is for this assumption to be made, I understand how someone could believe that it is real. Fresh Off the Boat is the first show in 20 years to feature an Asian-American family; before that, Margaret Cho was trying to prove that she was an “All American Girl” on her sitcom that was wrought with Asian stereotypes.

In the decades between these two shows, Asian actors have been cast in some movies—but when have Asians in Hollywood held a leading role in a film other than an action movie? The only one I can think of is Harold and Kumar. We have been the perpetual sidekicks, rarely the stars. Lucy Liu, introduced to us in her role as Dragon-Lady-Gone-Lawyer in Ally McBeal hasn’t strayed far from this first impression, constantly portraying the alluring-exotic-sometimes-lethal love interest, never the hero of her own story, never someone a wider audience can identify with as they travel on an emotional journey together.

When we are the leads, we are featured in action movies, doing slick martial arts. The story doesn’t get any more complex or meaningful than getting out of a tricky situation using some kung fu. Since kung fu movies became popular in the 1970s, audiences have sat in dark theaters, absorbing these same images with nothing left to challenge these notions other than people who aren’t too weary of this microaggressor to answer, “No, I don’t know kung fu, and neither do all Asians.”

Cast of Fresh Off the Boat — Cast of *Fresh Off the Boat*

But what do you do when you actually fit those stereotypes that you must fight against?

I am an Asian-American woman of Chinese and Irish descent. I was a straight-A, piano-playing overachiever in high school. My grandfather was a laundry man and my grandmother owned a restaurant. I grew up doing kung fu.

My parents were my teachers. I didn’t get sugary cereal and cartoons on Saturday mornings–I was at their school, practicing kung fu. A common backdrop of my childhood was basically a Rocky training montage, people red-faced and sweating, doing drills to improve their skills.

The school would do street performances, impressing crowds of tourists in Fanieul Hall with fighting sets and animal-inspired techniques that they had only ever seen in movies. I watched my parents and their troupe as they flew through the air, doing butterfly and hurricane kicks, sometimes whipping weapons under their legs as they took flight. I clapped when the audience clapped, but I had also seen these routines practiced countless times before the show. Even at a young age, I understood that these skills weren’t just magically bestowed or gained in a montage. They required hard work and sacrifice.

My everyday life was a behind-the-scenes look at the kung fu movies that left everyone so impressed. Many of my parents’ students were actually super heroes—stunt doubles for movies like Mortal Combat, Batman, and Power Rangers. I watched these movies at home and understood that those characters were real people—people I knew. I understood that there was a difference between the action portrayed in films, and real stories in our lives.

The majority of my parents’ students were not in movies, they were just regular people looking for a new way to work out and feel good about themselves. They were young and old, college students and professionals of many different racial and cultural backgrounds. Kung fu wasn’t something that was just for Asians. But that’s not what the media would have us believe.

When people ask me, “Do you know kung fu?”

I can actually answer, “Yes.”

Being able to affirm someone’s stereotype isn’t a proud or happy moment. I stopped expecting people to shut up, satisfied with knowing that they met an Asian who did kung fu. Instead, I am met with more questions, microaggressors that are just as presumptuous and ignorant as assuming someone of Asian ancestry knows martial arts.

I don’t usually tell people I know kung fu, but when I do, I brace myself for the same conversation I have had with people my whole life—literally my whole life, ever since I was in preschool:

Are you a black belt?

To which I explain that not every school has a rank system, and that my parents’ school is one of those that does not. The emphasis in their training is not about forcing their students into the same rigorous, ever-advancing tests, but helping each student individually. But that’s not what people want to hear. When I tell people I’m not a black belt, they become incredulous, questioning my skills. They continue to prod, often asking:

Can you kick my butt?

This question became more sexualized as I grew up. Other women don’t usually want to know, it’s only men who ask, accompanied by a not-so-subtle smugness that suggested they wanted me to be able to physically dominate them. I got that question and that look even when I was a young teenager.

Because every Asian-looking school girl is super smart and can kick ass, right?

The honest answer: No.

I might be able to throw a punch, but hitting a pad in a kung fu class is different from fighting off Go-Go and the Crazy 88.

Western audiences aren’t interested in the talking points though; they just want to fast-forward to the action. They glorify the violence and exotify Chinese culture, while completely missing out the subtle, important messages of martial arts training: values like discipline, hard work, and how your training and skills aren’t used to harm others, but to better yourself. Kung fu isn’t about fighting an enemy. It’s about making yourself a better human being—inside and outside. By focusing on the action without compelling storylines or characters we can care about, the art of kung fu itself—like Asian action stars and layman—has been flattened to a caricature.

What 24 years of martial arts training has given me aren’t skills to show off my physical prowess, but mental endurance and confidence, a sense of empowerment to speak up when something isn’t right. In the end, those are the battles that really matter.

Raised by martial artists, Katie Li grew up with fascinating stories and an eclectic cast of characters. She continues this tradition in her work, writing fiction and narrative non-fiction about personal transformation and unlikely possibilities. Her work has appeared in The Huffington Post, Xenith, and Write From Wrong. Learn more at www.katieliwriter.com or follow her on Twitter @KatieLi_Writer.

‘English-Vinglish’: Straddling Patriarchal and Linguistic Hegemony

Moving away from the Bollywood style masala and dancing-around-the-trees numbers, this film focuses on the real-life issue of the position of women in the domestic and social spheres in India.

This guest post by Asma Sayed previously appeared at AwaaZ Magazine and appears here as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture. Cross-posted with permission.

English-Vinglish is a new addition to the increasing number of Indian crossover films—socially progressive films that can still be commercially successful on a global scale. Moving away from the Bollywood style masala and dancing-around-the-trees numbers, this film focuses on the real-life issue of the position of women in the domestic and social spheres in India. Traditionally, many Indian feminist filmmakers such as Deepa Mehta, Meera Nair, Gurinder Chadha and Aparna Sen have made films about subject matter generally not discussed in the mainstream cinema: domestic violence, prostitution and trafficking, sexuality, and women’s rights in general. While these filmmakers continue to direct films with new and varied focuses, it is also exciting to witness the new generation of female directors in India that includes Anusha Rizvi (Peepli Live), Kiran Rao (Dhobi Ghat) and now, Gauri Shinde (English-Vinglish), who are doing excellent work and bringing unconventional cinema and subject matter to audiences. In a country where women’s role in society is very complex—on one hand, there have been female presidents and prime ministers, and on the other, the society remains highly patriarchal and there are the growing concernsrelated to the imbalance in birth sex ratiosresulting from female foeticide—presenting women’s life experiences can be a daunting task.

In her debut film English-Vinglish, Gauri Shinde, the writer and director, takes charge of the issue of women’s role in a society still suffering from the colonial mindset where people’s worth is judged on the base of their proficiency in English. Shashi (Sridevi), the protagonist of the film, is a wife and a mother, and also a good cook. She puts her culinary skills to work by starting a small home-based business selling “laddoos,” an Indian sweet. But Shashi’s knowledge of English is limited, and her tween daughter, the older of the two children in the family, and her husband Satish (Adil Hussain) continuously make fun of her linguistic incompetency. The daughter is embarrassed about her mother’s minimal knowledge of English and does not want Shashi to go to school with her as Shashi will not able to converse in English with other mothers or with the principal of the convent school. Satish is complicit in deriding Shashi’s weaknesses. Shashi feels justifiably belittled and insecure. Nonetheless, despite the lack of appreciation that her family shows toward her, Shashi never sways in performing her motherly and wifely duties. As part of a patriarchal system that she doesn’t explicitly question, she accepts that Satish expects her to have his breakfast ready in the morning, and that shebe ready to warm his bed by night. As such, Shashi spends her time doing all the household chores and running her small business, and never finds a moment for herself.

Incidentally, performing another of her traditional roles, Shashi has to travel to America alone to help her sister plan her daughter’s wedding. Once in America, she reads a billboard advertising English classes that promise fluency in four weeks. Shashi starts attending classes. What follows is reminiscent of the 1970s BBC sitcom Mind Your Language and the follow-up Indian Hindi sitcom titled Zabaan Sambhalke. Shashi’s classmates are from various ethnicities and nationalities; all of them are struggling with their language skills and ultimately become good friends as they learn English. One of her classmates, a Frenchman, Laurent (Mehdi Nebbou), falls in love with Shashi. As the film progresses, Shashi’s husband and children come to Manhattan to attend the wedding. Shashi, who has been making all the arrangements for the wedding, makes laddoos for the party. When Satish makes the statement that —“My wife was born to make laddoos”—Shashi is supported by her niece who reminds Shashi that she is capable of much more than laddoo-making and is far more competent than her husband perceives her to be. At the wedding party, Shashi gives a speech—yes, in English. She reminds the couple getting married, as well as her husband and daughter, of the value of family and the need to support one another without being “judgmental” – a word Shashi has picked up from one of the many English films she has watched to learn the language. After her speech, both Satish and their daughter apologize to Shashi for their ill-manners. However, this repentanceemanates only after Shashi has learned English and in so doing learned her own self-worth. Shashi comes to appreciate herself, her work and her identity, and becomes a more confident woman.

The film is certainly entertaining and well-made. The plot is tight-knit and gripping. The film attempts to showcase the everyday reality of women’s position in male-controlled Indian society. But, ultimately, the message that Shashi imparts in her speech is very conventional.When I watched the movie the first time, I was reminded of an advertisement that I saw in Gujarati newspapers when I was growing up in India. The bold writing at the top of the advert read “modern but good mother.” The advert insisted that a mother who is modern enough to know the world around her would ensure that she used the product it advertised. I never got over the conjunction “but” in that caption. The word posed modernity and motherhood as antithetical – any modern woman had to make a special attempt to simultaneously be a “good” mother. The institution of motherhood is much glamorized in contemporary societies in that a woman is deemed incomplete if she is unwilling or unable to conceive. Motherhood is still considered a central tenet of female identity. And yet, in a changing neoliberal and patriarchal society people fail to see the value of women’s domestic chores including those related to motherhood, and as such mother-work is neither socially respected nor valued economically. This reality is reinforced at the end of the film for Shashi’s role does not change – she is still the same housewife and a doting mother – although one who can now speak English. Shashi’s speech about family values brings her right back to square one; thus, Shashi’s role is static. Therefore, the film does not suggest any radical transformation of women’s social roles. It merely demands from them a higher level of education that, while potentially personally fulfilling, is not intended to challenge their traditional roles and could be argued to be simply placing more pressure on women. Moreover, the audience does not get a glimpse into Shashi’s feelings for Laurent; when her niece questions her about Laurent, all that Shashi says is that she does not need love, but respect. Shashi thanks Laurent for making her feel special, but as a dedicated Indian wife, she is not allowed to have any feelings of her own, and she goes right back to the husband who didn’t appreciate her much – one is to be hopeful that he will be a changed person when they land in India off the airplane from America, but then, can the patriarchal ideologies that have been internalized over the years be forgotten that quickly? After all, following more than six decades of decolonization, India has not unlearned the hegemony of English.

The role of language has been debated continuously in the post-colonial world. While English came to countries such as India and Africa as a result of colonization, it has endured and, in India, now has a much stronger hold than during the colonial period. English has become a tool of what R. Radhakrishnan has called “cultural modernization.” However, English has been a contested language in post-colonial world at large. For instance, while Ngugi Wa Thing’o wrote that “language is a collective memory bank of people’s experience in history” and refused to write in English, Chinua Achebe declared that the language that the colonizers left behind belonged to him. While he decided to use it, he saw it as remade via appropriation: for the English he used had “to be new English, still in full communion with its ancestral home but altered to suit its new African surroundings.” Whether it is Standard English, or appropriated, favoring the language at the cost of indigenous languages is a political move and a culture-altering exercise.

One cannot deny that English has become a lingua franca in India, and that sadly, there is linguistic hierarchy in the nation with English as the ticket to upward mobility. Thus, the fact that in the film, Shashi proves her worth by learning English showcases India’s highly colonialist linguistic history. However, India’s women’s liberation movement can certainly do without adhering to such hegemonic ideologies. At one point in the film Shashi is ecstatic when she learns the word “entrepreneur” – she is told that she was an entrepreneur as she sold sweets. Suddenly, this English word gives new elevated meaning and value to her work, making her feel important and confident. She walks the streets of New York saying the word repeatedly. In showing Shashi’s success through her acquisition of English, Shinde fails to address other issues of a post-colonial nation. Many advertisements and mainstream films in India play on the insecurities of women; for instance, the fairness creams are a huge market in this country where women are always reminded by society and through these ads that dark-skinned women are somehow inferior. Similarly, in this case, those who lack the knowledge of English have to prove their worth by learning the language of the colonizers. In not moving away from a colonialist mind frame, Indians are fulfilling Lord Macaulay’s desire, expressed in his 1835 “Minute on Education,” “to form a class of persons, Indians in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions . . . .” It is an irony that in a country which has its own richness of multiple languages, the hegemony of English has outlasted British colonial times.

Ultimately the film is about an Indian woman’s moral and family values – Shashi shows no interest in Laurent, the Frenchman who loves her, nor does she even once abandon her saree and mangal sutra –signifiers of a married Hindu woman – when in America. At the end, Shashi is just an English-speaking, sacrificial Indian woman – not a woman who has awakened to her rights or to her own needs. Shashi’s confidence returns after she found acceptance by a Frenchman, and after her husband and daughter have found her worth enhanced due to her English speaking skills. This is a classic example of patriarchal and linguistic supremacy. Shashi depends on the approval of men to feel good about herself. She also proves her worth by learning English. One does wonder if a single woman speaking Marathi or Gujarati or Tamil or Telugu has anything to feel good about.

An entertaining crossover film, English-Vinglish fails to deliver the feminist message that it may have intended to bring forth. While in various interviews the director has demonstrated her awareness of British colonization and Indian people’s misplaced awe of white people, it is a shame that rather than showcasing the ridiculousness of racialized and colonial insecurities, the film ultimately fails to transmit a message of awareness. Instead this work falls prey to the same stereotypes the director appears to critique.

Dr. Asma Sayed teaches English, Communication Studies, and Women’s Studies in Canadian universities. She has published three books as well as several refereed articles and book chapters, on such topics as diaspora literature, Canadian comparative literature, Indian cinema, and women’s representation in cinema. She writes a film column for AwaaZ: Voices, a periodical in Kenya.

‘Mother India’: Woman, Pillar of the Nation

‘Mother India’ treats Radha’s abnegating nature as a positive. Look how nobly she suffers for her husband and sons, the movie seems to say. In real life, such glorification of women’s suffering enables an exploitative system of economic growth on the backs of underpaid, overworked women. They get nothing except lip service, sometimes not even that.

This guest post by AP appears as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture.

“All Hindi films come from Mother India” – Javed Akhtar (lyricist, poet and scriptwriter)

Many people consider Mother India (1957) the definitive Hindi film. This legendary film won countless accolades, earned higher revenues than any film before it, and ran for more than three decades. Wondering what all the fuss what about, I watched it recently for the first time. It’s highly entertaining and moving, with a great plot, dialogues and music. It’s three hours long, so I spread my viewing over a couple of days. Despite its length, it drags very little.

The iconic Mother India poster, where Radha (Nargis) bears a heavy wooden plough almost like a crucifix — The iconic *Mother India* poster, where Radha (Nargis) bears a heavy wooden plough almost like a crucifix.

The film tells the story of Radha (Nargis), a farmer, from her days as a young bride to her old age. When Radha gets married and moves to her husband’s house, she lives a happy life until she learns that her mother-in-law has taken a loan from the usurious village moneylender to pay for the wedding. Unable to repay the loan, and beset by tragic accidents and a disastrous flood, the family eventually becomes impoverished. Radha loses her husband and mother-in-law, and raises her children on her own. She suffers great hardship but raises them to adulthood, and even faces down the crude advances of the moneylender.

Years pass; the family survives, but continues to be exploited by the moneylender. One of Radha’s sons, Birju, grows to hate the moneylender, and finally snaps. Circumstances lead him to become a bandit. He kills the moneylender, and for further revenge, abducts his daughter.

One son dutifully gets married and settles down. The other, Birju (reclining), is much more rebellious and restless.

Radha is distraught: she cannot stand to see a girl’s honour violated. She threatens to kill Birju, telling him that dishonouring any girl of the village, is tantamount to dishonouring the entire village, which includes his own mother. When Birju tries to ride away with the kidnapped girl, Radha shoots him dead.

“I am a woman. I can give up a son, but I can’t give up honour.”

Several years pass; Radha is an aged woman. There is a hopeful note in the air: modern technologies are being introduced by the government to increase agricultural productivity and lessen the peasant’s burden. The villagers revere Radha for all she’s done, and invite her to inaugurate the new irrigation canal. Water the colour of blood flows through the canal, a reminder of Radha’s sacrifices.

After watching the film, I understand why it was such a big deal. It’s because it captured the mood of the nation, its values, hopes and aspirations. At the time, about 80 percent of Indians were engaged in agriculture. The colonial yoke had been thrown off. The film reflects the period’s broad consensus that for the nation to progress, two things were required: food security through advancement in agriculture, and rapid industrialization through investment in heavy machinery. The film is a celebration of farming, and shows reverence of the land that nurtures us.

The movie also celebrates the idea of woman as the nation’s pillar of strength. I’ll focus on this theme, and on the character of Radha.

The Bad

In some ways, Mother India is quite conventional. Its intended messages about women are regressive from a feminist point of view. The movie conveys that the ideal woman is nurturing, self-sacrificing and hardworking. It ignores the reality that women did all of this for very little reward. For all their sacrifices, did woman have a say even in basic decisions like how many children to have? Not much. In the 1950s, when the movie was released, women’s legal rights were severely restricted; for example, the progressive legislations introduced by stalwarts like B. R. Ambedkar and Jawaharlal Nehru, for Hindu women’s inheritance and marriage rights, had been stonewalled and diluted in Parliament.

Mother India highlights the plight of the farmer, but glosses over or erases the specific difficulties faced by women farmers specifically: lack of access to resources, invisibilization of their labour, and their self-deprivation in times of scarcity. In times of food insecurity, adult women often deprive themselves and girl children of adequate food. It is not necessarily forced upon them; more often it’s a choice (made in the context of patriarchal society).

Mother India treats Radha’s abnegating nature as a positive. Look how nobly she suffers for her husband and sons, the movie seems to say. In real life, such glorification of women’s suffering enables an exploitative system of economic growth on the backs of underpaid, overworked women. They get nothing except lip service, sometimes not even that.

Lastly, a central theme of the movie is honour/modesty. Radha values honour – her own and other women’s – over and above everything else. Maintaining honour is the prime duty of a woman. Her honour is not just her own, but the family’s, the village’s, and by extension the nation’s. But the problem with honour is that to maintain it, women’s mobility, freedom and sexuality must be tightly controlled.

The Good

Having said all that, there are some ways in which the character of Radha is a triumph for women’s representation in Indian cinema. She is a formidable, determined woman. She is uneducated (she can’t read the moneylender’s accounts), but she is tough and practical. She has the skills, knowledge, and the will to protect and raise her children. She never dithers or acts silly. She commands respect from her sons, from the villagers, and from the audience. She has to make tough choices in bleak circumstances. She breaks two negative stereotypes: that women are not intelligent, capable decision-makers, and that women don’t do arduous labour. In Mother India, it is the woman who builds the nation with her sweat and toil.

Through images, music, and lyrics, the movie establishes Radha’s sheer physical strength. The foregrounding of physical power is rare in today’s female characters, but appropriate for a portrayal of a rural woman.

Standing in waist deep water, Radha holds her children up on a wooden platform during the flood.

On one hand, the audience is inspired (maybe even awestruck), by Radha’s resilience, and by her steadfast adherence to her moral code. But at the same time her humanity takes centre stage, and she is allowed to express a range of emotions. She suffers devastating losses, is disrespected, and is sometimes terrified for herself and her family. She also enjoys periods of relative prosperity, good harvests, the joys and frustrations of family life.

After the flood, a helpless Radha begs food from the moneylender, who makes improper advances.

Radha turns furiously and beseechingly to the image of the goddess in the moneylender’s house. “You may lift the burden of the entire world, goddess. But try lifting the burden of motherhood – your feet will falter.” — Radha turns furiously and beseechingly to the image of the goddess in the moneylender’s house: “You may lift the burden of the entire world, goddess. But try lifting the burden of motherhood – your feet will falter.”

Radha celebrates the birth of a grandchild.

Radha hears of her son Birju harassing village girls, especially the moneylender’s daughter. She refuses to speak to him, or eat. A contrite Birju adopts the murga position to convince her to eat.

She warns Birju that she can forgive all his mischief, except for maligning the reputation of a girl of the village. She ties up her sons to teach them a lesson.

In the climactic scene, Radha shoots dead her son Birju. Framed starkly against the sky, Radha is an awe-inspiring figure, a wrathful goddess. She is rendered human the next minute, when she runs to her dying son and holds him, weeping.

The last point about Radha is her love for the land. She does backbreaking work with dignity and forbearance, not just because she has to feed her children, but because she considers the land her mother.

When the villagers want to abandon the village after a devastating flood, Radha persuades them to stay, and together they begin the laborious task of clearing the flooded land.

On one hand, Mother India suffers from fatal flaws – the glorification of traditional gender roles and modesty/honour. On the other hand, the film’s recognition of women’s contribution to building then nation, its characterization of Radha, and its reverence for farmers, are its triumphs. Paradoxically, the character of Radha is mired in stereotypes, but also represents women’s labour, and can serve as a source of strength and inspiration for Indian women.

The agricultural focus is also key. I’ll end with this evocative scene: the villagers have weathered calamities, and there is a song celebrating a good harvest. With the last line of the song, there is an image of haystacks shaped like the map of India, inside which farmers are singing and dancing. Today, with agriculture in dire straits in India and several other parts of the world, Mother India’s image of agricultural prosperity becomes even more important to work toward.

AP is a student. She likes traveling, good food, and movies.

‘The World Before Her’: Between Liberalization and Fundamentalism–India’s Two Faces

This guest post by Asma Sayed previously appeared at AwaaZ Magazine and appears here as part of our theme week on Asian Womanhood in Pop Culture. Cross-posted with permission.

“I hate [Mahatma] Gandhi; frankly speaking, I hate Gandhi,” declares Prachi, a 24-year-old young woman. “I am here to win [the Miss India title], and that’s my only goal,” says Ruhi, a 19-year-old. Indo- Canadian director Nisha Pahuja’s documentary film The World Before Her captures the worlds of these two young women representing many other women in contemporary India. The World Before Her is a thought-provoking, disturbing, and yet, compelling documentary that brings together the seemingly opposite worlds of Hindu nationalist ideologies and beauty pageants. Prachi and Ruhi denote dualistic faces of a country undergoing swift change. The documentary juxtaposes two female-dominated Indian communities: one is centered around the biannual camps organized by Durga Vahini, women’s wing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), a Hindu nationalist organization, and the other is the month-long preparatory training event leading up to the live broadcast of the Miss India beauty pageant.

The film was completed in 2012 and has been on the international film festival circuit in the interim, and won many awards, but its theatrical release in India in June 2014 coincides in ironic ways with the election of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May 2014. Modi’s political party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is known to be closely affiliated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a Hindu nationalist group that operates on the principles of Hindutva. VHP, founded in 1964, is closely aligned with the RSS and functions under the umbrella of Sangh Parivar, a group of organizations dedicated to Hindu nationalist movement. In short, these are different groups that share similar ideologies and have strong ties to the current ruling party in India. Prime Minister Modi is famously known to have been an active member of the RSS since the age of 8.

Male training camps, called shakhas, organized by the youth wing of VHP/RSS, called Bajrang Dal, have existed for decades and have branches in India and abroad, and their activities have been largely known. By contrast, very little information has circulated about the female wing—Durga Vahini (Carrier of Durga)—which is a comparatively newer innovation with roots going back to 1991. Pahuja’s direction exposes this largely unknown female world that prepares women for traditional Hindu social roles as wives and mothers, but also for militia-style combat in defense of the Hindu nation, if necessary. Pahuja is the first filmmaker to have gained access to these exclusive camps organized by the Durga Vahini group. Her film is a courageous attempt to present the realities of extremist ideologies taught in the camps, and of linking them to the various events that have troubled India in the last decade and a half: the film shows footage of the Malegaon bombings, the Gujarat pogrom of 2002, and VHP/RSS members consistently acting as morality police by violently ransacking bars to ensure girls and women do not drink, dance, and mingle with the opposite sex.

Girls attending the Durga Vahini camps are between the ages of 12 and 25. They follow a regimented training schedule that includes martial arts, physical fitness training, and lectures that remind them of their Hindu identity. They are instructed about the virtue of fighting against Muslims, Christians, and Westernization, all presented as the antithesis of Hindu nationalist ideals. The film captures a lecture where girls and young women are being taught that “Muslims and Christians are attacking our [Hindu] culture,” and that the people in caps and beards look like demons similar to those described in the ancient Hindu scriptures. They are told that it is not Gandhi’s non-violence that brought independence to India, but the sacrifice of thousands of Hindu martyrs.

Prachi, one of the strongest Durga Vahini female members, who with several years of experience in the camp, also acts as a leader to the next generation of campers, speaks out against beauty pageants, the second subject of the film, which, to her, represent Western decadence. Having herself attended more than 40 camps, Prachi has been inculcated into accepting the values that the camp organizers promote. Girls in the camp chant simultaneously “dudh mango kheer denge; Kashmir mango chir denge” – “if you ask for milk, we will give you rice pudding; if you ask for Kashmir, we will slit your throat,” referring to India’s long conflict with Pakistan over the Kashmir valley region. When a camper is asked if she has any Muslim friends, she replies, “I am very proud to say that I have no Muslim friends.” Prachi too declares that she is willing to build a bomb and blast it “if conditions call for it.”

On the other hand, Prachi’s father is eager to marry her off against her wish. He has no qualms admitting that he hits her, if necessary, to ensure that she obeys. He proudly mentions that when Prachi was a child he burned her leg with a hot iron rod. Prachi does not object; she believes it is his right as a parent. In a country where 750,000 girl fetuses are aborted every year and the statistics for female infanticide remain undocumented, Prachi is happy that her father let her live. She points out that “many traditional families kill a girl child. He let me live; that’s the best part,” she says.

Then again, in Mumbai, Pahuja cinematographically captures the daily activities of 20 young Miss India hopefuls. Their focus is dramatically different: filled with regimen–Botox injections, skin whitening treatments, catwalks, and diction training. This female world is one focused on glamour, on pleasing the male-dominated jury, and on preparing for the big break that will come with the title of Miss India. Many of the pageant’s participants aim for Bollywood screen-careers. In fact, many former winners have gone on to become famous Bollywood stars: Aishwarya Rai, Shusmita Sen, Priyanka Chopra and Lara Dutta, among others. However, the young women who perceive the Miss India pageant as a path to freedom, fame and equality, largely fail to note the irony of the situation as they are made to walk in front of juries in bikinis, or with their upper bodies covered under white sacks so that the jury members may assess the “beauty” of their legs: sexual objectification and conformity to traditional beauty paradigms is not the equivalent of personal freedom. The few who are aware, at all, of the problematic of their current situation, brush it off, considering it a small price to pay to achieve the stardom that awaits them. And, of course, that stardom will come at a cost, as well.

Pahuja’s camera follows Ruhi, one of the contestants from a lower-middle class family in a small town. Ruhi’s parents support her dream, and are keen to see her win the title. In many ways, Ruhi represents the dreams of a young generation of women in India. Pahuja also interviews Pooja Chopra, a former Miss India. Raised by a single mother, Chopra participated in the pageant in an attempt to prove herself to her father, who had wanted her mother to either kill her (after she was born) or give her up for adoption, as he did not want a girl child. Thus, the documentary beautifully mirrors the lives of different women in many ways, all of whom in one way or another, are attempting to prove their worth and their right to live, whether it is in taking up arms in defense of Hindu nationalism or succumbing to traditional ideals of worth equated with female beauty.

While these young girls and women are all attempting to empower themselves, their attempts are reflective of the inherently flawed options available to them. There is an innate sadness in these women’s attempts at either becoming part of a right wing fundamentalist group or using their bodies to showcase their worth. Neither of these efforts contribute to improving women’s condition and advancing women’s rights in patriarchal India, now troubled by a variety of issues including increasing gender tensions in a global world where women are, to greater and lesser degrees, aware that change is possible, if not quite within reach. However, the recent rise in gang rapes is a testament to the fact that India has a very long way to go before majority of women in India will be anywhere closer to gaining equal rights.

With Modi coming to power, it becomes increasingly important to be aware of the influence of groups such as VHP and RSS, and how they will sway the political rhetoric as well as women’s rights in India. In a recent interview with filmmaker Shazia Javed, Pahuja, speaking of the content of her film, said that “with the new government, people really need to know that these things exist . . . Now that the BJP and Modi are in power, we have no idea what is going to happen. But to me, it feels that these groups feel a certain kind of validation. They feel emboldened; there is a confidence now. So I think that the film reminds us that we can’t close our eyes. It reminds us that there is a potential for these movements to grow and that is a threat.” Pahuja sees the film as going beyond the issues of women’s rights; according to her, the film is about India, and what’s happening there, and the fear about the future as the culture of the country goes through extreme changes. She adds that, through the film, she would like to showcase the kind of “hatred being taught in the camps in the guise of patriotism.” Starting in October 2014, Pahuja has done grassroots screening of the film with women’s rights and human rights activists, and those who work in the area of communal harmony. The World Before Her, well researched and edited, is a welcome addition to social issue films.