New Delhi, Sep 26 (PTI) Filmmaker Varsha Bharath says she never felt represented on screen while growing up and that inspired her directorial debut “Bad Girl”, a Tamil coming-of-age film exploring themes of identity, desire, and societal pressure on women.
Bharath said the idea of the story was actually born out of her need to tell the story.
“I’ve never really felt represented on screen. Growing up watching a lot of Tamil movies, I never really felt like my stories were told, nor was I given the impression that my stories were important. So it was born out of a need to really watch a chick flick in my language with people who look like me,” she told PTI in an interview.
Bharath said she wanted to ensure women feel their emotions and feelings represented on screen.
“Rhetoric is pretty pointless. I feel like what is more helpful is for women to look at the screen and feel like their emotions are valid, their feelings are valid. I felt like just looking at on screen and feeling represented is more important. And it makes you feel a little less alone in this world. And that’s what I tried to do through this movie.” Featuring Anjali Sivaraman in the lead role, the film follows Ramya’s (Sivaraman) journey as she transitions from high school to adulthood.
The incidents in the film are fictitious, but the feelings attached are very personal for Bharath.
“The incidents are fictitious; the events that take place in the movie are all fiction. But the feelings are very personal. It’s not an autobiographical film. But I remember feeling alienated and lost, and those feelings are real. The emotions are true,” she said.
Explaining the idea behind the title of the film, Bharath said it was supposed to be sarcastic, but recalled how people in Chennai assumed the project was about a bad person.
“The title is actually meant to be sarcastic, although I think, especially in Chennai, when it released, a lot of people thought in the literal sense that I was trying to tell the story of someone who’s not a good person. But it’s just a label,” she said.
“Women are often told that they’re bad, simply because they just want to live out their desires. The title is just a way of saying that all of these labels are not really true. And even if someone does something bad at some point in their life, that doesn’t make them a bad person,” she added.
The film, which had its world premiere at the prestigious 54th International Film Festival Rotterdam in February, landed itself in a controversy earlier this year for what certain segments deemed as Brahmin-bashing. Bharath said she had no intention to bash anyone but she wanted to highlight casteism as it stems from her personal experience.
“I feel like the intention was definitely to be critical about caste and casteism, and from a very personal perspective, and how it can impact a person’s state of mind. Brahmin bashing was definitely not the intention… I think we live in times where it’s important for one to be critical of oneself and one’s own community. And that’s the only way we can hope to get anywhere in these times,” she said.
Bharath has previously worked as an assistant director alongside acclaimed director Vetrimaaran on films such as “Visaranai” and “Vada Chennai”. Vetrimaaran serves as a producer on “Bad Girl” alongside Anurag Kashyap.
Bharat said both of them wanted her to grow as a filmmaker through the process.
“I had a producer in Vetrimaaran who always said, ‘Don’t worry about numbers because the objective was always to make a really good film’. Even with Anurag sir, they both just released me from the responsibilities of commerce.
“All they wanted was for me to really grow as a filmmaker in this process, and all of the feedback I got was in terms of craft. It’s a privilege that a lot of first-time filmmakers don’t get. I’m a little bit spoiled at this point because of the kind of partnerships that happened in this movie,” she said.
The Tamil version of “Bad Girl” released in theatres on September 5 and the Hindi version came out on Friday.
The movie also stars Shanthi Priya, Saranya Ravichandran, Hridhu Haroon, TeeJay Arunasalam, and Sashank Bommireddipalli. The music has been composed by Amit Trivedi. PTI ATR ATR BK BK
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