The growth of queer content in Hindi cinema over the past decade has been marginal. The gay characters in Bollywood has been usually portayed as overtly feminine and sexed-up characters and often the object of mockery. There is nothing wrong in the portrayal of the gay man as feminine, but it becomes problematic when it’s the only representation over the years. The other image of the ‘gay man’ constantly represented by ‘serious’ mainstream (Page 3, Metro and Bombay Talkies), is the image of someone who you can’t really trust. He will ultimately steal your boyfriend or husband. Again it is not that these things don’t happen in society, but is problematic when it’s the only image you are bombarded with.
In 2005, I directed My Brother Nikhil, which was the first mainstream Hindi film where the male protagonist was gay. It was a difficult film to make and we did not get help from traditional finance sources.
I don’t know if one would really call Dostana as a part of queer cinema as the male protagonists are not really gay. Having said that, it would be foolish to overlook the positive impact of Dostana. One important moment in the film is when the mother (Kirron Kher) believes her son (Abhishek) is gay and accepts him and his partner. It’s a very important gesture even if it’s meant to be fake, as it meant acceptance by the family, which is one of most precious social structures in India. From the year 2004 to now, if you look at the landscape of queer Hindi cinema, it’s negligible. Why do we not see more queer content?
I made I Am in 2011. While we celebrate films like Brokeback Mountain in India, which won an Oscar (2006) My Brother Nikhil, despite winning 12 film awards and traveling to 40 international film festivals was overlooked by all the media awards in India. Seven years later I Am does not find any takers for satellite. So you wonder, as a filmmaker, who empowers you and who disempowers you from making cinema that provokes?
We can still fight the Censor Board and argue with them. But how do you fight when channels refuse to air your films? How do you find exhibitors and distributors for your cinema? I am sure if platforms are provided our industry will move on and tell these stories. But it cannot happen in isolation. Queer content in Hindi cinema will continue to be marginal or regressive till the distribution avenues open up. Filmmakers, who want to try and still tell the marginalised stories, find it increasingly difficult to be heard.
In Hollywood, films having queer content like Philadelphia, Milk, Brokeback Mountain, J Edgar are not only celebrated but also get stars backings. Stars like Leonardo Di Caprio (Total Eclipse) to Tom Hanks and Michael Douglas have portrayed gay characters without inhibitions.
Recently, I was narrating a film to a young ‘star’. I mentioned that in an action sequence there was a kind of sexual tension between two men for a moment (the characters were not gay) and he nearly fainted. In Hollywood, the film industry stands up for different causes related to human rights including gay rights. In India, have you ever seen a male star at a gay parade? You don’t need to be gay to support gay/human rights!
We were a culture that celebrated all kinds of sexuality and you can see that in our architecture, literature and paintings. If we go to Konark, we will see so many sculptures where women are shown being physical with each other. Do you need an A certificate to enter the temple premises? As long as someone is not harming someone else, what that person chooses to do where sexuality is strictly his/her private domain.
I hope that Bombay Talkies will find satellite release because that might encourage more films with queer content to be backed by studios. But one should not forget that be it I Am or Bombay Talkies, queer stories were only a part of the films unlike My Brother Nikhil, Fire or what we get to see in regional cinema — Chitrangda (Rituparno Ghosh), Not Just Another Love Story (Kaushik Ghosh), Memories of March (Sanjoy Nag) or Natrang (Marathi) and Sancharam (Malayalam). Filmmakers like Sridhar who has been making queer cinema for many years find it impossible to get finance and releases.
But people like him who support and organise the LGBT film festival in Mumbai (Kashish) are, through their initiative, bringing queer cinema out. The festival has a huge audience and is hosted in multiplexes. Initiatives like these need support of sponsors that will help create a wider audience for queer content films.
Onir has directed film like My Brother Nikhil, Bas Ek Pal, Sorry Bhai and I Am.
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