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I don't know how much of an impact critics have on the films Bollywood makes, but the completely privilege-blind lens through which they see cinema contributes to films like Madam Chief Minister being made and promoted this way.
Remember Gully Boy? Virtually no critic called it out for being cultural appropriation and poverty porn. In fact, no one seriously called it out for brownfacing either. This one critic who did say something in his review later interviewed Zoya Akhtar and asked her about it.
Zoya's had some cockamie response which was an obvious lie that even a journalism student would know to press further with counter-questions. But this chap swallowed it blindly and did an entire article about this "clarification", absolving Zoya Akhtar. You know why?
Because he wanted to like the film. He'd called it the best film of the decade in his review and he was just too enamoured with his ill-informed opinion to pose this question.
But this isn't all.
But this isn't all.
At the time, I wanted to write an article arguing that Gully Boy amounts to cultural appropriation. I pitched it to an editor of a legacy media house. I expected my email to go unanswered (as is normal for freelancers). But I got a very quick response asking me..
..how a film like this would get made in Bollywood, if not this way. I responded with an argument that is reasonable and very widely accepted today: that this story should be told by people from that world.
This person, who I must reiterate, is an editor at a legacy media house, replied saying "By that logic we can't make any films about space".
I then pitched it to another publication, who accepted it, but decided to edit the part where I'd criticised brownfacing..
I then pitched it to another publication, who accepted it, but decided to edit the part where I'd criticised brownfacing..
..to make it seem like it was just my opinion and not an undeniable fact.
These are the people who write or control whatever gets published about films. They won't write how preposterous it is for a show like Panchayat to have no mention of caste.
These are the people who write or control whatever gets published about films. They won't write how preposterous it is for a show like Panchayat to have no mention of caste.
They won't write how brownfacing Ranveer Singh in Gully Boy and later the Kapil Dev biopic is supremely fucked up.
And that is how this shit is perpetuated. For these people, "freedom" is the ability of privileged filmmakers and actors being able to make whatever they want.
And that is how this shit is perpetuated. For these people, "freedom" is the ability of privileged filmmakers and actors being able to make whatever they want.
Their idea of "freedom" doesn't extend to people from marginalised communities being able to even enter the film industry. They just want the freedom to be mediocre and tone-deaf as long as everyone in their circles pats them on the back for doing something "bold".
