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While Girl On The Train was extremely disappointing, did the makers really need to show a negative character with all the cultural symbols?
With the dearth of new Bollywood releases and because I enjoyed the book and the Hollywood movie, I slumped on my sofa for Parineeti Chopra’s ‘Girl On The Train.’ The Hindi adaptation recently released on Netflix.
To say that the movie was a disappointment on several different levels, including over the top acting and emotion is an understatement. However, it was the adaptation of the book I loved, so I continued watching it.
The only saving grace of the movie in terms of acting was the turban-clad police officer, played by Kirti Kulhari. It was hard to miss her charismatic presence as Inspector Dalbir. However, the darker side of Inspector Dalbir made me wonder why did it have to specifically be the female turban-clad police officer.
Agreed the premise of the movie was London, which has a dominant Sikh community. Nonetheless, a woman wearing a turban is not that common even there.
At the same time, would I have been ok with a turban clad man or a hijab-wearing woman? Honestly, that would be debatable. The reason being one wouldn’t be able to show a Sikh man without a turban. But a Sikh woman wearing a turban is a pure choice, at least as per my knowledge.
Hence, was that characterisation necessary? Especially when the character is shown to have done gruesome crimes.
All stories have a character in shades of black, white and grey. And if one makes a movie with a South Asian star cast, specific identities for them is hard to forego. But casting an extremely negative character, with an identity that is not common, only drew my attention to ‘why the turban?’
Is it plain insensitivity on the part of the casting of the character? Or is it a conscious attempt to further marginalise communities already fighting for rights in some areas of the world?
Names and skin colour do enough to showcase differences, but that’s something we can’t get away with. Having characters wear specific physical symbols, in my opinion, is in the least insensitive. And if I can take it a few notches up, absolutely derogatory if portrayed in the negative.
Picture credits: Still from the movie Girl On The Train
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We've laughed with them, we've cried over them - now, from Cinderella to Coco, let us examine whether our beloved children's movies go on to pass the Bechdel test or not.
We’ve laughed with them, we’ve cried over them – now, from Cinderella to Coco, let us examine whether our beloved children’s movies go on to pass the Bechdel test or not.
There are many movies that practically lit up my childhood. But, now that I am a well-informed adult, I know that they weren’t perfect. Especially, when looked at from a feminist perspective.
The Bechdel test is simple. Named after American cartoonist, Alison Bechdel, the test asks if a work of fiction has at least two named women (I’m also counting non-human female characters in movies which feature non-human main characters)who talk to each other about something other than a man. It’s surprising how many movies fail this very easy test. Sadly, for me, I realized that many of the children’s movies that were really close to my heart also failed the test. Here’s how eleven beloved children’s films that I revisited, fare on the Bechdel test: