Opinion Gender in the movie hall: What made ‘Oppenheimer’ a bigger hit than ‘Barbie’ in India

Though it is the stuff of common knowledge, it bears repeating: Biological sex has little to do with gender. Our gender identities are socially constructed. From early childhood, we are socialised into narrow gender practices — whether it is the choice of colours (pink vs blue), toys (dolls vs guns), clothes (skirts vs pants) or disciplines (STEM vs humanities/social sciences). These practices are based on what is socially sanctioned or culturally expected of our gender identities. It is the same in the case of media consumption. What we are forced to, encouraged to, or expected to watch shapes our gender identities. Such consumption over a period of time further cements the gender divide so that we actively seek media that conforms with our gender identity and allows us to perform it.

Put differently, a majority of men are not naturally predisposed towards Oppenheimer, but are championing the film perhaps because it helps them perform masculinity. Unless consciously addressed, such gender construction processes are self-reinforcing. Men may, after all, like Barbie if they don’t judge it prematurely and give it a chance. Unfortunately, the stronger the gender-genre associations, the more it hierarchises good, not-so-good, and bad cinema. Such a hierarchy, unsurprisingly, is patterned along gender relations in society. So, while genres associated with men become respectable, those with women and non-binary people tend to be seen as “campy”.

Breaking down the gender divide in media consumption will be a step towards loosening the grip of gender norms over our lives. How do we go about doing that? First and foremost, we can be more curious, experimental, and critical in our media diets and cultivate a more inclusive viewing culture, i.e. more fusion, less fission. Maybe watch Barbie and Oppenheimer both or, as one is strongly inclined to advise at the moment, watch neither. At least not until the stardust and mushroom clouds of clashing fandoms settle down. Studios and distributors are banking on respective fan communities to spend millions of rupees to make a point about themselves. Rumours of Swifties (Taylor Swift fans) shoring up the US economy, notwithstanding such economic wringing of fandoms, deserve deep scrutiny and discussion.

It is important to strive for greater gender diversity among audiences. Reportedly, around two-thirds of the Indian theatre-going audiences are male. (This is indicative of perhaps why Oppenheimer is doing better than Barbie in India, bucking the larger, global trends). Film industries continue to imagine a paying cis-heterosexual male as the default audience of the films they produce. Therefore, most of the fare is geared toward their sensibilities and expectations. The continued underrepresentation of women and non-binary people among audiences should be read as an index of their exclusion from the larger spaces of culture and leisure.

High ticket pricing and concerns around public safety, including safe and accessible transportation, are also some of the reasons why the participation of women and non-binary people in theatregoing is not optimal. There are also growing concerns about the gendered digital divide; women’s access to digital devices and the internet continues to be lower than men’s access to the same. Until there’s a substantial shift in the make-up of audiences, the film industry will continue to target the consumer they imagine has the means to be sitting in the theatres or is in control of digital devices.

Efforts should be made to boost behind-the-screen gender diversity as well. This means the inclusion of more women and gender non-binary people in creative decision-making positions. Inclusion is even worth aspiring to as an end in itself. Behind-the-screen gender inclusion should be the goal not only because gender-sensitive and inclusive stories are missing from cinema, but because women and non-binary people are missing in the structures of the film industry. However, such diversity initiatives should not be premised on the understanding or condition that they would necessarily lead to radical storytelling. Such conditional inclusion restricts women and non-binary people to only certain topics and storytelling. Why limit the Greta Gerwigs to only making Barbies? Fixing the on-screen gender representation deficit cannot only be the burden of those who have been kept at the very margins of the industry.

To be sure, the growing diversity among the ranks of film writers, directors, directors of photography, editors, lyricists, music directors, and playback singers, among other roles, is indeed bringing some freshness to Indian cinema. So are sections of critical and vocal audiences who are demanding more and demanding better cinema. However, the more things change, the more they remain the same as creative professionals from the oppressed castes and the transgender community still remain severely underrepresented.

The writers are Mumbai-based media researchers and practitioners