Mani Ratnam’s wife Suhasini Maniratnam says there’s ‘lot of skin exposure’ in films because women are being ‘exploited’

Suhasini Maniratnam said that representation of women in commercial cinema has changed since 2010, but before that, it was all about 'taming of the shrew.'

By: Entertainment Desk

Mumbai | Updated: October 28, 2024 07:36 PM IST

3 min read

Suhasini Maniratnam talks about depiction of women in cinema. (Photo: Suhasini Maniratnam/Insagram)

Actor-filmmaker Suhasini Maniratnam said that women in cinema are being “exploited” in the name of “freedom of expression,” as more artistes are embracing the warped idea of equating showing skin with being “liberated”.The cinema veteran, who has worked across the Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada film industries, lashed out at the “Western” influences that Indian cinema seems to be under.

In an interview with Mathrubhumi, Suhasini Maniratnam was asked how she views the representation of women in contemporary cinema, to which she said that in a quest to “copy” the West, artistes have lost their way. “There is a lot of freedom in skin exposure and close scenes because we’re copying the West and we don’t mind doing sensuous scenes. From the directors to the artists, they are a little more liberalized (now). We are again back to the exploitation of women. Women are doing this willingly, whether it is body exposure or close (intimate) scenes.

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“Earlier on, to be in the rat race, you had to do those kinds of scenes even though you didn’t believe in them. But today, you are saying, ‘mentally I am free to do this. It’s not for money, it’s not to be number one. But I’ll do whatever I want.’ So, I think in that facade of freedom of expression, women are exploited in films,” she added.

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She said that the representation of women in commercial cinema has changed since 2010, but before that, it was all about “taming of the shrew.” Suhasini Maniratnam said that commercial films were dominated by the male gaze, which was challenged by women in society.

“Whether it was Vijay or anybody else’s film. Now, Vijay doesn’t do it. He has done films with Asin and others where it was taming of the shrew. I’m not blaming him because it was the director who had brought in the taming of the shrew. It’s also a story, isn’t it? We’ve had it for so many years, and we didn’t complain, so why are we complaining about it now?

“It’s because women have woken up and asking why is every film about taming the shrew? An arrogant, modern girl is sobered down by the man. Any Hindi mainstream film if you’d take, that was the main thing,” she added.

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