Paper:

Film and Female: Silencing the Violence on Wo/men

A.C. Sreehari

Behind every successful man, there is a woman-boy

Daddy Cool [2009]

Male domination is so rooted in our collective unconscious that we no longer even see it. It is so in tune with our expectations that it becomes hard to challenge it. Now, more than ever, it is crucial that we work to dissolve the apparently obvious and explore the symbolic structures of the androcentric unconscious that still exists in men and women alike. What are the mechanisms and institutions which make possible the continued reproduction of this age-old domination by men? And is it possible to neutralise them in order to liberate the forces for change which they are instrumental in blocking?

Pierre Bourdieu On male domination

Films as representations have to be seen as fundamental to the creation of history and

culture. Films have been understood as modes of signification through which social

realities get constructed. This paper thus aims at calling attention to the web of social

conditions related to the production, circulation and consumption of films within the

economy of power with relation to the construction of culture(s). Culture becomes

comprehensible only as a multiplicity of local cultures, diversity in culture, religion,

tradition, etc. The idea of a well-defined and monolithic community is erroneous and

even dangerous. The folk tradition itself has been pluralist in character, but the notion of

the unified one has been abroad for well over a century. The last one hundred years - or

more specifically after India became independent - has witnessed the institutionalization

of the regional culture and the establishment of different regional institutions.

This paper attempts to analyse two national award winning feature films in Malayalam on

‘Theyyams,’ a diverse, particular and locally different folk performance of North Kerala,

to see if decolonization is a desired objective and cultural homogenization still prevails in

Kerala as in the colonial period. What do film and television, the most influential mass

media do in this regard and if the state and its ideological apparatuses have any influence

on the viewing public. The complex relationship between the global and the local is most

powerfully represented in films. It makes available a semioticised space for the

articulation of the global imaginary and its construction within the phenomenology of the

local. A study of the Malayalam films on Theyyam will make this idea clear.

The dance ritual of Theyyam is the most prominent amongst the festivals of North

Kerala. Among these, the ritual dance staged in Bhagavathi temples or Kavus [small

patches of evergreen forests] in propitiation of the deities deserves special attention. As a

religious and social institution, it has a significant place in the cultural history of the

region. For instance, the cult of mother goddess has an important place in Theyyam.

Besides, the practice like spirit-worship, hero worship, tree worship, ancestor worship,

animal worship, serpent-worship, worship of the goddesses of disease and gramadevatha

worship are included in the main stream of Theyyam cult.

Of all the ritual art forms that are practiced in Kerala, Theyyam is perhaps one of the

most awe inspiring rituals and provides a real treat for the cultural buff. The old view

which ascribed the origin of Theyyam to Devil dance1 by the West has now been

discredited. This ritual art was performed and known only in Kannur and Kasargod

districts of Kerala till the Tourism Promotion Council initiatives in the state retrieved and

elevated it to the status of a pan – Kerala heritage. Theyyam has changed substantially

incorporating new trends and sub cults along with its tribal character. In short it can be

stated that all prominent characteristics of primitive tribal religious worship had widened

the stream of Theyyam cult and made it a deep-rooted folk religion of the masses.

Representation and resistance are very broad arenas within which much of the colonialist

relations and postcolonial examination and subversion of those relations have taken

place. In both conquest and colonization, performances have played a major part. Most of

the performers in the post-independence period reveal the pressure of history on the

consciousness of the reformed spirit. In governmental enterprises Theyyams have been

made a tool for national integration while political parties made use of the popularity of

Theyyams to popularize their ideas, accommodating them as visual art or a show piece.2

In cinema, one finds that Theyyam gets shorn off their regional dimensions. Film, a

patriarchal, white industry3 never attempts to fairly depict the female and minorities. It

does the same thing with the low cast[e] men who perform Theyyam. Theyyams are

noted for their pro–female, subaltern stance. But this gets reversed in films. In the film

Kaliyattam [The Play of God: 1997] by one of the most popular directors of Malayalam

1 V. Dinesasn. “Theyyam Puthiya Kaalatthil Avatharikkumbol,” Mathrubhumi Weekly, [2006 Feb. 5-11] 30-35.2 Dr. M.G.S. Narayanan in the foreword written to the first edition of “The Cult of Teyyam and Hero Worship in Kerala,” by Dr. K.K.N. Kurup [1973] concludes by these words: “Let the ancestral spirits of North Malabar come out of their obscure village shrines and perform on the world stage.”3 David Considine in Critical Viewing and Critical Thinking Skills asks if film, a patriarchal white industry, fairly depict women and minorities? www.medialit.org/reading_room/article202.html -

film industry, Jayaraj, the female is smothered to death by the protagonist for her

suspected infidelity. But the male in the film and his act of killing himself out of the

unbearable remorse are portrayed with heroic proportions as in Greek tragedies.4

[Kandanarkelan enters the bonfire] In Pulijanmam [Tiger Life: 2006], a film by

Priyanandanan, the female is treated as a frail partner who could not be relied upon

crucial moments. This again is ahistorical as women always had played significant roles

in almost all social interventions made by men, especially in Kerala.5 Devanarthakan

[The Divine Dancer:2001], a documentary film by Sudhish Gopalakrishnan on the life

and artistic career of Narthaka Ratnam Kanna Peruvannan, the Theyyam artist is cast in

the premises of the upper caste, rather than that of the natural habitat of Theyyams, i.e.,

Kaavu/Sacred forests of North Kerala. The whole story of his dispossessed life and the

anti brahmanical practices of Theyyam worship are sidestepped. Gothrasmruthi [The

First Culture: 1992] by M.A. Rahman, a documentary film on Theyyam performance,

focuses upon the mutuality of the male and a reassertion of virulent masculinity6, a

project he continued in his most acclaimed documentaries. The texts of both the feature

films share some common features in this regard, though conceived in different contexts

by different writers and directors. So are the documentaries. A re-view of all these would

reveal that the colonial eye/i-dentity still remain as the source and force behind any

representation in the so-called post colonial resistant era.

Representations of the orient have always attracted the western gaze.7 The urge to present

oneself as an object for Western, male eyes still defines the substance of the films mainly

4 Camille Paglia argues that Tragedy is a male-play.5 N. Prabhakaran and N. Sasidharan who co-scripted the films are otherwise considered to be politically correct writers. in Malayalam6 M.A. Rahman accepts the ideas from Visual Anthropology without questioning its vested interests in many of his essays.7 Edward Said, argues that Orientalism also became a discursive process by which the West sought to establish its power over the Orient

because the target viewer is never perceived to be the locals. It is the infection of the

snake-charmer syndrome and is characterized by the desire to present to the eyes of the

Western onlooker the myths they have created about the exotic Orient. Adoor and a host

of others have already opened doors to this exotic East. Adoor’s films, screened along

with Bollywood films which are mostly set in exotic places, are a feast to the eyes of the

West, are reported to be a passion in the International Film Festivals in Europe.8 [Slum

Dog Millionaire [2008] was appraised. So was Pather Panchali [1955], though

differently- for their lack of exotica]9

Films reach first in festivals abroad before they are made available here. First they

achieve national or international acclaim and come to the native viewers to be accepted

with applause. All the films discussed above have bagged national awards. Through such

films as Kaliyattam, which won the national award for the best film in 1997, by which

Jayaraj became the best director, and was screened in international film festivals and

Pulijanmam, the national award winning film of 2007, the native myths are made to be

viewed as national or international objects of wonder. Though both the films invoke a

rural, working class milieu where Theyyam rituals are performed with the patient joint

effort of a group of people10 Suresh Gopi and the much Murali, two national level best

actor award winners, representatives of powerful masculinity11 in Malayalam films, loom

large before the eyes of the viewers, as in any other commercial films, a ready made

commodity for the market. Sudhish Gopalakrishnan, who documented the life of Kannan

Peruvannan, named it Devanarthakan,, a sanskritised word that it is, cast him in the same 8 The Hindu dt. Sunday, Nov 02, 2008 Bollywood goes German http://www.thehindu.com/thehindu/mag/2008/11/02/stories/2008110250150500.htm9 In the Osacr Award issues related to Slum Dog Millionaire, film critics and directors made references to Ray and his films to this effect.10 A.K Nambiar, Secretatry, Folklore Academy, Kannur gives emphasis to this aspect more than anything else while writing on Teyyams.11 In many an article on them, critics are found coming to this consensus that they represent masculinity in Malayalam films, though in different ways.

mould of Kathakali, a highly stylized art form where the performers are mostly upper

caste men. In Shaji N. Karun’s Film Vanaprastham [The Last Dance: 2000], an Indo-

French-German collaboration, another national award winning film, Sudhish

Gopalakrishnan had worked as his directorial assistant, and this experience must have

made him attempt at a cultural homogenization, in Devanarthakan, side stepping the

issues of castes and tribal life. Both Jayaraj and Sudhish are brand ambassadors of the

popular male views whereas Priyanandanan and M.A. Rahman have cut off the diverse

issues related to the life of the Theyyam performers, attempting to justify the ways of the

universal male in their respective films.

The anticolonialists view culture as a site of conflict between the oppressors and the

oppressed. Postcolonialism engages with the culturalist myths of the past and brings to

cultural studies its own well established concepts of diversity, particularity and local

difference. Visual productions like films is supposed to play an important role in

decolonizing the mind and culture, through representing regions, whereby there is a

process of dismantling of the imperialist’s authorized version as well as liberating the

native life from colonial history. But while indigenous culture, tradition and sacred

beliefs are viewed as ways of resistance in the postcolonial era, only a unified being get

represented in film, which is the malady of our times.

As Partha Chatterjee put it, “Threre is a renewed attempt to impose a particular brand of

the modernized upper-caste Brahmanical culture as the true national culture on the

grounds that all the great nations of the west were built through a process of cultural

homogenization.”12

12 Partha Chatterjee. Five Hundred Years of Fear and Love, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 33, No. 22 (May 30 - Jun. 5, 1998), pp. 1330-1336

References

1. Bourdieu, Pierre. Masculine Domination. London: Polity Press, 2001

2. Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. Harmond Sworth: Penguin, 1967

3. Muraleedharan, T. “National Interests, Regional Concerns: Historicising

Malayalam Cinema.” Deep Focus (Jan-May 2005) 85-93

4. Said, Edward. Orientalism. London: Routledge, 1976

5. Tarabout, Gilles. “Malabar Gods, Nation-Building and World Culture: On

Perceptions of the Local and the Global.” Globalizing India: Perspectives

from Below. Ed. Jackie Assayaj and C.J. Fuller. London: Anthem Press, 2005

6. Zarilli, Philip B. Kathakali Dance-Drama: Where Gods and Demons Come to

Play. London: Routledge, 2000