It is often observed that Bollywood always associates the women folk to beauty, charisma and style. There’s hardly any mention of their acting prowess. It’s not because they don’t possess the ability to emote perfectly, but because they were never thought anything more than glamour dolls. And this phenomenon is nothing new to this industry.
From it’s inception till date, the way a woman is portrayed on screen is a far cry to our Western counterparts. Hollywood churns out female-centric stories like Lara Croft: The Tomb Raider and the Kill Bill series at regular intervals. However, in Bollywood, a female centric film means an arty genre, which only pulls critics to the theatres not crowds. From Raveena Tandon, Karisma Kapoor to Kangana Ranaut, Priyanka Chopra, everyone fell prey to this mediocrity on the part of the industry.
Say for example, Aishwarya Rai who was equally good as Jodha in Ashutosh Gowarikar’s Jodhaa Akbar, but it was Hrithik Roshan who walked away with the Best Actor trophy in almost all the award ceremonies.
The past comes calling
There were random instances of stalwarts like Bimal Roy, Guru Dutt, Mehboob Khan and Raj Kapoor making an exception with their brilliant presentation of women excelling as a wife, mother and beloved. Bimal Roy’s Bandini, Sujata, had women taking centre stage in the film with powerful performances by Nutan. But unfortunately, the films got tagged as art cinema, thereby alienating it from the mainstream Hindi movies.
The poetically beautiful, scintillating, and mesmerizing Madhubala too fell prey to this trend until Mughal-E-Azam came along to prove her worth as a fine actress. Not only her touch-me-not beauty enthralled the audiences, but also her superb portrayal of forlorn courtesan in love with the heir to the throne of Hindustan, Salim. Before she got immortalised by Mughal-E-Azam , she was often seen doing little to minute roles in films like Chalti Ka Naam Gaddi, Kalapani, Mr. And Mrs. 55, etc. Same goes for Nargis, who though was a quintessential element in all Raj Kapoor movies and was equally wonderful as the showman himself, remained just heroes’ love-interest. In films like Shree 420, Awaara and others, she was just Raj Kapoor’s heroine who gets him back on track when he goes astray. It took Mehboob Khan’s Mother India to bring out the actress in her and bag an Academy Award nomination.
However, there was an exception in the form of Meena Kumari who was one actress for whom roles were
tailor-made. She was the most versatile actress of all times. She could equally match up to the comic histrionics of Kishore Kumar in Shararat and also play the tragedy queen in Saheb Biwi Aur Ghulam convincingly. She was not just another pretty face in tinsel-town but an actress whose expressions used to speak a 1000 words.
But other actresses like Sadhna, Nanda, Saira Banu, Sharmila Tagore, though were iconic, their presence in the films used to just add on to the glamour quotient. Even actresses like Vyajanthimala, Hema Malini and others were just dancing divas which used to eclipse their acting prowess.
The worst 90’s
This trend took a turn for the worse with the advent of 90s. It was an era of actions films and required well-built actors who could bash up 10-20 goons singlehandedly. So while actors like Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgan. Suniel Shetty, and other did the beating up parts, actresses like Madhuri Dixit, Juhi Chawla, Raveena Tandon, Karisma Kapoor were just their muses. Being confined to sing and dance routines, actresses took more interest on the way they dressed than the way they act. Even a brilliant actress Tabu did films which couldn’t prove the brilliance of this actress. She debuted in a commercial flick Prem and did many such films like Ek Chor Ek Sipahi, Vijaypath, and others, which confined her to the glam doll image. Then came the hard-hitting Astitva and Chandni Bar, which not only bagged her two National Awards each, but also an identity of a talented actress. Same goes for Madhuri Dixit (Mrityudand), Raveena Tandon (Daman) and Karisma Kapoor (Fiza, Zubeida).
However, Sridevi is one actress who not only managed to get author-backed roles in majority of her films but also excelled in it. She started her career with Solva Saawan after doing loads of south Indian films. Her second film Himmatwala was a big success and she also got recognized but she kept on getting same kind of roles and even
starred in a few. She took the most daring step to be different from the rest when she signed Sadma. Here she played the role of an amnesic girl, which won her adulations and the National Award for Best Actress alike. And the rest as they say is history. She went on into doing some of the enviable roles of all times in films like Naagin, Lamhe, Chaalbaaz, Judaai, and others.
Apart from her, no one was as lucky to go anywhere near to her. And with such movies in circulation, the female audiences always felt left out or cheated to see the state of girls being so weak and demoralizing in films. The wardrobe exhibition which the heroines took to towards the end of the 20th century made them more prone to being just a glamour doll.
The Present
In the present times, we do get to see female-centric films coming out every year. But other than Fashion, none of these films scoop up a heavy total at the box-office. They are still tagged as ‘Unconventional films’. But with a surge of new starlets, filmmakers and storytellers, the trend is somewhat moving towards the brighter side. Today films like Lajja, Chameli, Woh Lamhe, Fashion and others do hit the theatres but the frequency is too rare to get noticed. Even if they are not classified as non-commercial films, they still have a niche audience mostly girls themselves. So the reach of such films is still negligible when compared to a Shah Rukh Khan or Salman Khan starrer.
