Lipstick under My Burkha – I had not heard of this film until yesterday and until the Central Board for Film Certification (CBFC or the nation’s Censor Board as it is better known) refused to certifify the film for release. Since this made headlines yesterday, I found out about this film and am now dying to watch it. So why is the CBFC blocking the release of this film which is making waves at international film festivals and which involves some very fine actors and filmmakers?
The movie is about four small town women, their secret desires, their little rebellions and their struggles against the shackles that matrimony, patriarchy and society at large places upon them; the expectations that stem from those shackles. The four women are a 55 year old widow, a mother of three, a beautician and a college girl. Lipstick here is clearly a metaphor for forbidden desires; bukha the metaphor for constraints and strictures routinely placed on women.
The film is produced by Prakash Jha, who has given us films like Damul, Mrityudand, Gangaajal, Apaharan, Raajneeti, Aarakshan, Chakravyuh and Satyagraha in the past and is directed by Alankrita Shrivastava. The film stars Konkona Sen Sharma, Ratna Pathak, Aahana Kumra and Plabita Borthakur.
Lipstick under My Burkha premiered at the Tokyo Film Festival, where it got Spirit of Asia Prize and at the Mumbai Film Festival, where it won the Oxfam Award for Best Film on Gender Equality.
Apparently it is a ‘lady-oriented’ film that puts “fantasy above life” and contains “sexual scenes, abusive words, audio pornography and a bit sensitive touch about one particular section of society. The censor board’s (we’ll call it this because it acts as such) use of the word ‘lady’; its squeamish refusal to use the word ‘woman’ is indicative here… that women must be ‘lady-like’ must ‘behave’ themselves in accordance with societal expectations. Clearly it offends the powers that be; that women are not behaving in a ladylike manner at all in this film and that quaint guidelines such as these are flouted: “clean and healthy entertainment” that “does not deprave the morality of the audience.”
Mansplaining is a term derived from the words man and explaining and is defined as, "to explain something to someone, typically a man to woman, in a manner regarded as condescending or patronizing”. Many on social media thought that the reaction of the censor board is a classic example of mansplaining. Many celebrities and filmmakers also came out in support of the film and against the regressive stand of the censor board.
The censor board seems to have no problem with utterly crass, brainless and completely tawdry films that cater to the male gaze and their fantasies such as those in the pic above, but woe betide a film where women dare to challenge social norms!
Warning: this may deprave the morality of some audiences. So may I suggest that those who are easily offended not watch the film or even this trailer; and those of us who are less easily offended get on with the watching?
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