CultureCinema Navarasa: Probing The Problematic Depiction Of Women In The Anthology

Navarasa: Probing The Problematic Depiction Of Women In The Anthology

It is saddening to see a series put together by some of the most brilliant minds of the Tamil film industry, had the potential to show women more progressively and yet did not.

*Major spoilers are ahead

Navarasa, the latest Tamil outing on Netflix India, is a project undertaken to help the suffering Tamil film industry during this pandemic. With a star-studded ensemble both in front of and behind the camera, there were huge expectations from and hype around Navarasa. But it turned out to be a mediocre outing with few hits and few misses. However, what we will focus on is the glaring issue of how the series depicted women.

The first story in Navarasa, ‘Edhiri,’ deals with the emotion – ‘Karuna or Compassion’. Savithri (played by Revathy) witnesses her husband’s murderer – Dheena (Vijay Sethupathi), walk away from her home. The short then grapples with the reasons and consequences of this murder. We later get to know that Savithri’s unnamed husband (Prakash Raj) played a pivotal role in pushing Dheena‘s brother to suicide. When Dheena comes to confront him, his cavalier reaction enrages Dheena, who then bludgeons him to death. As Dheena walked away, he ran into Savithri, who stood dumbfounded, unable to process this info and react. Later, a guilt-ridden Dheena seeks out Savithri for forgiveness. All this is well and good, but here lies my issue. 

In a movie where the two male characters have committed heinous crimes: one pushed someone towards suicide and the other committed murder; the woman is the one who finally takes the fall due to her shortcomings. And her so-called flaw was – she had a dysfunctional relationship with her husband, with whom she was not on talking terms for over a decade. Thus, she concludes she is not the right person to pardon Dheena.

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Navarasa: Probing The Problematic Depiction Of Women In The Anthology
Image Source: SheThePeople

The director might be trying to portray Savithri’s character as flawed but what does this add to the overall story? Except making her a person not worthy of issuing a pardon in both her eyes and the audience, only because she did not play the virtuous and dutiful wife to her dead husband?

The director might be trying to portray Savithri‘s character as flawed but what does this add to the overall story? Except making her a person not worthy of issuing a pardon in both her eyes and the audience, only because she did not play the virtuous and dutiful wife to her dead husband? Savithri‘s character has the potential to just end the cycle of violence between the two families by showing compassion to a repenting Dheena, but instead, that the director focuses on building the narrative of Savithri as too flawed to forgive has grave patriarchal undertones. And to think, the setup was right there, all the director needed to do was not add that extra estrangement between the married couple and scapegoat the wife.

‘Roudhram’ – the sixth entry in Navarasa is on the emotion ‘Raudra or Anger’. I found this the best made of the lot but also most problematic, story-wise. A downtrodden family is struggling to make ends meet. The mother, a domestic helper, goes to extreme lengths to at least provide fleeting moments of happiness to her struggling children. In the process, she is forced into sex with her employer in return of financial help. Her children witnesses this, which pushes them to extreme anger. The son kills the employer with a hammer; while the daughter nurses immense rage and resentment towards her mother all her life.

Image Source: jfwonline.com

Anyone who does not find an issue with this story might be still stuck in the archaic thinking where the woman’s so-called ‘purity’, ‘chastity’ and ‘sanctity’ are given the utmost importance. This thought process undermines sex workers, portraying them as nothing more than a blight and showcases them as societal outlaws. Shouldn’t the son have reflected and taken responsibility for his earlier tantrums that pushed the mother to take such an extreme step? Shouldn’t the daughter understand the immense sacrifice made by her mother and sympathise with her precarious situation? But instead, once again, we see a woman being defined by a sexual act.

‘Inmai,‘ meaning ‘devoid of,’ is the seventh entry in Navarasa, which is based on the emotion of ‘Bhaya- Fear.’ While the extremely stereotypical portrayal of Muslims in the film requires an entire article dedicated to its critical unpacking, this R Rathindran Prasad directorial also has a warped representation of women. While Parvathy Thiruvothu plays Waheeda, a different actress, Ammu Abhirami, plays the younger Waheeda. One wonders why was this creative decision taken especially when we see both Siddharth and later Suriya’s characters, who are well into their 40s, play younger versions of themselves.

But Parvathy, who is just in her early 30s, is not deemed good enough to play a younger teenage version of herself. Why is it? Why do we set impossible expectations of women’s physicality in our cinema? When will we start depicting men as age-appropriate? I mean, when it comes to our actors, we still see them well into their 60s romancing girls in their 20s and running around the trees singing duets. But when it comes to women actors, we see 30 year olds playing mothers to 50-year-old heroes. Why do we have such hypocrisy?

Image Source: cinemaexpress

Coming to the final short in Navarasa, Guitar Kambi Mele Nindru, based on Shringaara or Romance, we see Nethra, played by Prayaga Martin play romantic interest to Suriya’s Kamal in a painfully long sequence. The short is bizarre in how it primarily uses Nethra to pedestalise Kamal throughout, pushing him to believe in his work and sing tall praises of his music whereas, the skills of Nethra, who is a singer too, aren’t probed. She is only used to build Kamal‘s character, who cannot get over the fact that everything Nethra says resembles the conversation he had with his mother. In addition to feeding the narrative of how Kamal is attracted to Nethra who is an extension of his mother, in that sense, the film also does an Imtiaz Ali in how Nethra is a manic pixie dream girl, who is merely an instrument in getting the man to his destination and has no character arc or storyline of her own.

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In addition to feeding the narrative of how Kamal is attracted to Nethra who is an extension of his mother, the film also does an Imtiaz Ali in how Nethra is a manic pixie dream girl, who is merely an instrument in getting the man to his destination and has no character arc or storyline of her own.

Image Source: OnManorama

There was barely a single female character or storyline that stood out in Navarasa. It saddens me to think that a series put together by some of the most brilliant minds of the Tamil film industry failed to make any strides in how women are depicted in mainstream media.

How far away are we from seeing woman not being portrayed as mere scapegoats or just means to further stories? When will we start viewing ‘her’ as an individual and not in respect to interactions with the characters around?


Sindhu JaiBalaji works as a product manager for a retail company. As a side hustle, she runs a bookstagram account, which you can find here

Comments:

  1. Shruti Sridharan says:

    Very well observed, Sindhu! 🙌🏽
    The subtle yet insidious undertones of discrimination in films directed by cis-male identifying directors can be hard to notice, especially when we, the audience, irrespective of gender, have been conditioned to consumed so much of it over so many generations… Sigh
    But calling it out is not an option anymore. It is a necessity. Thanks for this article! 🤗

  2. Anonymous says:

    Also you need to know that feminism is not the word to make equality for women its the word that means equality for men and women donot make fake controversies

  3. Sameer says:

    Suriya is the protagonist, it’s told from his perspective. It’s obviously going to be different if it’s a female director because it would be her voice. The attempt is to portray a woman unafraid to express her desires to someone she’s attracted to rather than a typical boy stalks a shy girl. Why would she need praise, they both are competent at what they do but the only distinctive quality a woman has is her sexuality, which is told from a man’s perspective. So wtf?

  4. Sameer says:

    The point of roudhram is to show how anger manifests. One got angry and did a crime, the same anger made the other a police. The anger seemed more at the overall circumstances of their lives than particularly being about her mom. Sure, now that she’s an accomplished officer she could’ve looked at the past in a more sympathetic tone. But the ending has to reinforce which kind of anger is the strongest

  5. Sameer says:

    The weakest film is karuna surprisingly written by mani Ratnam. The conflict is not dramatic or meaningful enough to leave an impact. But imagine you switched the roles, Revathi is a corrupt banker who gets killed and prakash raj is the one feeling guilty in a temple. Does it make any difference in what it’s trying to say? No. Because it’s not about a dutiful wife, it’s about a web of guilt and remorse these characters are stuck in.

    • Sameer says:

      So stop force fitting works of art into your narrow prism of fake feminiy, instead try to see it for what the artist intended it to be about

  6. Rama says:

    Why is this even a surprise. Maniratnam movies have always been about men. His movies are set in a world where it’s for men to take. The life is from a man’s perspective always. The women in movies are strong only until a man comes along and then they are just simpering fools who are unsympathetic and mean to the man. The woman is saved by the man in the end and the man emerges victor. Woman are mere peripheral beings in their own lives once the man appears in their lives.
    I haven’t watched this movie and don’t plan to. After reading this review I don’t think I will ever watch it. They sound like more of the same.

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