Recently, a young director blamed a section of North Indian youth living in Chennai for the drug menace. But S.VE. Sekar begs to differ. “Such accusations are baseless. Remote areas and many villages of Tamil Nadu are also notorious for drugs. Being under the influence of drugs is different from propagation and circulation of drugs,” he says.
“Most of the young directors have no in-depth knowledge of the society: they believe hearsay and hardly conduct their own research. Without knowing the censor board’s guidelines, one should not be allowed to make movies. For instance, the movie Kaala, which had many communal references, was certified as ‘A’ in the foreign countries whereas in Tamil Nadu it was certified as ‘U’, " he adds.
S. VE. Sekar
Movies like Bombay, Vishwaroopam, Iruttu Araiyil Murattu Kuthu, Vada Chennai and some other recent movies have recently faced flak because their content was widely based on the lines of religion, race or caste.
“Comments made on body shaming or looks are also wrong”, says Dhananjayan, a film analyst. A comedy actor from the movie Jackpot had faced racist comments based on his appearance. “A film should have neutral and healthy humour which can be enjoyed by all. Humour based on a particular person's religion, caste, colour or looks is immature and belittling and I'm totally against it. Earlier there was a trend of stereotyping — all the dons in the movies were always depicted as Christians. Filmmakers should take responsibility to break such stereotypes”.
Dhananjayan
Movies targeting a community should also be stopped to avoid repercussions in society. “What we show has an impact on the people’s mind. There is a huge disparity in the levels of education in our society. Mass communication plays a major role in the way people are portrayed or depicted as viewers learn from that”, says Abhirami Iyer, who has often faced harassment for her surname having a casteist reference.
“I have to explain saying that this is just a surname”, she says. “Many films demand fair skinned heroines and prefer actors from the north. This type of categorisation should not be there. People should learn to see beyond the colour of the skin”, she adds.
