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When I watched Thappad recently, I realised it was a slap on the face of several notions of society. Here are the five that remained with me throughout.
In mainstream movies, a Thappad (Slap) is a tried and tested ‘therapy’ to correct the ‘wrongdoings’ of a person. Generally, it is the female lead who is given the beating by the males. In the end, the movie justifies his ‘heroic’ action and win applause from the audience. However, Thappad was a breath of fresh air with the dose of right questions and answers.
It is an intelligently written film. Taapsee’s character Amrita, initially the ‘perfect’ housewife, takes on a bumpy road when she realises what she went through in her marriage. A slap was her realisation to what she was compromising on- respect, career, and freedom, among many.
We are sensitive about women’s issues. More often than not, our social system tells the women to ‘adjust’ before tying the knot. When she is not okay with something, we try to protect her rather than addressing the problem. The end result is that the problem remains there, and she faces an inner battle often left to herself.
Thappad gives a tight slap to some unthinkable and meaningless notions prevalent in society. Which are the ones we are talking about?
When Thappad hit the theatres in February, the Hindi film industry already witnessed two major releases with two leading woman actors. Kangana Ranaut’s Panga and Deepika Padukone’s Chhapaak were already making waves. It was a heartening change to see from India’s biggest film industry.
Thappad is one film which ticks all the right boxes and is a fine example to reinstate a proven fact – A film need not be preachy to deliver effective messages.
Streaming on: Amazon Prime
A version of this was earlier published here.
Picture credits: Still from movie Thappad
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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