Do you think female characters are too sanitised in Bollywood?

I was just thinking: as compared to Hollywood, Bollywood female characters are confined to a very sanitised space and are usually one-dimensional in nature. In Hollywood, we see a gamut of female characters - vulnerable, sassy, foul-mouthed/trashy, scheming, vindictive, psycho, messed up etc. etc.

In Bollywood, this range is not explored. It's either the good girl or the vamp, characters in between with nuances and shades of grey rarely exist, and if they do, they usually transcend these traits and become fully-fledged sati savirtris by the end, like Nandini in Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam. Very rarely do we come across complex characters like Piku (Piku) and Veera (Highway) who own their flaws and yet are not victims of their circumstances.

Do you think writers and writers in hesitant in depicting flawed women characters who may have traits which do not fall in with the typical Indian woman and have agency?

Also, what's with the goody two shoes image which most women have to portray?

Discuss.

I read this book called 'Lowland' by Jhumpa Lahiri, and was intrigued by the woman character called Gauri in the book. She was selfish, flawed, independent and yet the heroine of the story. She was not docile, not restricted to patriarchal gaze but had a distinct and unique voice and characterisation. I wish Bollywood created more such characters.

Yes it's true.

If a woman enjoys her sensuality and fashion, then she becomes a vamp.

If a woman is shown intellegent then she is considered as geek.

In real life a woman can be fashionable, sensual and intelligent.

I think Pink and Lipstick under my burkha had complex characters too.

but yes, since women are supposed to anchor their heroes, they have to be sati savitris or full fledged villians lik Kajol in Gupt or PC in Aitraaz

Even some male characters are like that. They have to be clear black and white. No room for grey

Sonam's character (Zoya) in Raanjhanaa was a complexe character. She was neither a vilain nor a good girl. She was selfish, short-sighted and manipulative but also suite naïve and childlike in the way she was some things.

Kangana Ranaut in Revolver Rani (Rani) or Tanu Weds Manu (Tanu) wasn't outwardly nice either.

Vidya Balan's character in Ishqiya was also quite manipulative.

Vishal Bhardwaj tends to write about complexes women who are capable of doing almost anything to attain their aim.

I'm pretty sure there are other such roles in Bollywood. It's not always about nice and naive girls vs vamps imo.

None of the women cited above were self-sacrificing and they all aimed to fulfill their selfish needs. Even Aishwarya as Paro was like this. She destroyed her own happiness and chose her pride to punish her Devdas condemning herself to a life of sorrow and her lover to a miserable death.

Originally posted by: Maraka_Musso89

Sonam's character (Zoya) in Raanjhanaa was a complexe character. She was neither a vilain nor a good girl. She was selfish, short-sighted and manipulative but also suite naïve and childlike in the way she was some things.

Kangana Ranaut in Revolver Rani (Rani) or Tanu Weds Manu (Tanu) wasn't outwardly nice either.

Vidya Balan's character in Ishqiya was also quite manipulative.

Vishal Bhardwaj tends to write about complexes women who are capable of doing almost anything to attain their aim.

I'm pretty sure there are other such roles in Bollywood. It's not always about nice and naive girls vs vamps imo.

None of the women cited above were self-sacrificing and they all aimed to fulfill their selfish needs. Even Aishwarya as Paro was like this. She destroyed her own happiness and chose her pride to punish her Devdas condemning herself to a life of sorrow and her lover to a miserable death.

What you cite are exceptions, though. Most of the blockbusters have 2-dimensional women with no nuance.

Originally posted by: HearMeRoar

What you cite are exceptions, though. Most of the blockbusters have 2-dimensional women with no nuance.

Even the men are mostly 2 dimensional

There have been a few complex female characters. However, the tendency is to create exaggerated goody two shoes and Savitri type female characters. It is the madonna-whore dichotomy. Women are either pure virginal aka good or promiscuous impure aka evil, they cannot be in between.

It is tricky to create flawed female characters in India though. Depending on what the flaws are women as dismissed as pseudo-feminist or trashy. For example Veere di Wedding and Four More Shots Please are panned and people hate on the characters. People clutch their pearls when women are sexually active or use vibrators.

Men get to cheat and be redeemed. Women cheating is always tragic and tears apart families. Men get to be drunken louts or promiscuous and still be heroes. Wiomen who do the same give feminism a bad name. Men can have anger management issues and still be romantic heroes. Women who do the same are nagging wives or bitchy girlfriends.

That being said I am not a fan of Mary Sue's either. The stereotypical strong female lead with zero qualities beyond being a strong female lead. I love Captain Marvel and Rey, but there is no doubt that they been done dirty by their films.

Steve Rogers's reasons to fight and friendship with Bucky are so well defined. Carol Danvers's reasons to fight and friendship with Maria Rambeau are all glossed over in favor of showing how powerful she is. Similarly, Luke Skywalker gets a very emotional journey from being a farm boy to a Jedi knight. Rey gets a similar journey from a scavenger to the most powerful Jedi, but the emotional element is completely stunted. That's why I love Birds of Prey so much.

Originally posted by: HearMeRoar

What you cite are exceptions, though. Most of the blockbusters have 2-dimensional women with no nuance.

The TM didn't specify there was exceptions though or that the thread was about blockbusters...