Writing in this issue of Frontline, the feminist scholar J. Devika says: “Malayalam cinema has been historically structured by feudal funding and practices, and women artistes were inevitably taken to be sexually available to the big male names.” This is true not just of Malayalam cinema but of every film industry across the country, where the prevalent patriarchal belief is that simply by entering the world of cinema, whether to pursue a career in acting, cinematography, or make-up, the woman ineludibly signs her body away. After any complaint, a set of tabloids and television channels inevitably pipes up with the claim that “adjustment” is a part of cinema after all.
“Adjustment” is of course the euphemism for free sexual access to a woman’s body, and that this is completely normalised shows the degree of institutionalised corruption in the world of cinema, which mirrors the system of hafta on the streets outside, where beggars to pedlars to petty shopkeepers have to pay off a gang leader or beat cop to stay in business. But whereas a gangster or corrupt cop might be rounded up once in a while, polite society seldom acknowledges that the physical hafta extracted from women aspirants in the film industry is a crime at all. That is because, and I touched upon this in my previous editorial, any woman who steps outside the confines of the patriarchal social order is considered to automatically forfeit the right to legal or social redress. In feudal times, it was considered part of the natural order for landowners to “own” the bodies of female workers, and surprise was only registered when any woman dared to protest.
This, then, is the gauntlet that has been thrown down by the publication of the Hema Committee report, which has seen skeletons tumbling out of some very powerful cupboards. Its repercussions are being felt beyond Kerala, in the neighbouring Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada film industries, all of which are rank cesspits of patriarchy.
After the 2018 #MeToo movement, this is a second defining moment in the country’s mass feminist awakening. As female actors, technicians, and crew speak up about sexual abuse, it has raised hopes that the omertà around the subject enforced by powerful industry men will be broken. For this to happen, women need to play leadership roles in the regulatory bodies of these industries, a first step towards which was the creation of the Women in Cinema Collective in Kerala in 2017 when female actors, producers, and directors walked out of the male-controlled Association of Malayalam Movie Artistes. Years later, it is paying off, as the stream of delays and smokescreens by powerful men in the industry and government is finally being dammed.
This is a powerful moment, and one hopes it will extend into labour and wage agreements, intimacy contracts, and larger questions of on-set sanitation, toilets, and dressing rooms. A lot also needs to be done outside the industry. The circus that parades as cinema journalism, with its quasi-fan personality, misogynistic interview questions, and intrusive paparazzi, is unequipped to engage seriously with the issue of sexual harassment. Equally complicit are the fan clubs, which viciously troll women who expose sexual abuse. Both phenomena are particularly prevalent in south Indian cinema. There is also the question of content—song lyrics and scripts are often nauseatingly chauvinistic and encourage off-screen offences.
Most importantly, the adoration of the male superhero must stop. It has created the idea of this godlike figure who cannot be questioned, who makes the cash registers jingle, in front of whom all beings must grovel. Bring him down, and a more equitable industry, whether in contracts or content, will inevitably follow.
