Veteran lyricist Javed Akhtar is known for not mincing words and putting out his thoughts without sugarcoating them. In a recent interview, he shared his two cents on the industry’s way of portraying strong and empowered women. He also reasoned why actresses like Sridevi and Madhuri Dixit didn’t get big roles in iconic movies like Mother India.
Javed Akhtar takes a dig at Yash Chopra for his film Jab Tak Hai Jaan
In a recent conversation with ABP Majha, Javed Akhtar spoke about the way the Hindi film industry has been portraying a strong woman in their films. The screenwriter and poet said that they aren’t clear who the new woman is and who can’t stay silent on watching injustice. Backing the statement, he stated two reasons.
According to him, if liberals define a modern woman, other liberals will question them. Hence, they hesitate to define them. Whereas those who are conservative, if they give any definition, they feel that they will lose a lot of their territory. So, they don’t want to do it. He further added that there were so many talented women like Sridevi and Madhuri Dixit but they didn’t get a big role in their entire career. They weren’t offered movies that became iconic like Mother India, Bandini, Sujata, and Sahib Bibi Aur Ghulam. “It is because people don’t know what is an ideal woman,” he stated.
He further added that today’s filmmakers are trying very hard to create an image of an empowered woman and are doing different types of experiments. But he thinks that those are ridiculous as they don’t know who is an empowered woman. Citing the example of Yash Chopra, he said that the filmmaker made many decent and competent movies. However, in Jab Tak Hai Jaan the heroine says ‘I will sleep with a man of all nationalities in the world before getting married.’
“Why will you do so much hard work?” Akhtar exclaimed. He further added, “To be empowered you don’t have to put in so much work. So, this is because it’s a debris and they are finding who is the modern woman in this. This is why many roles of females are not happening,” he said adding that if men do song and dance or some action and comedy then the movie is complete.
“There is no content. This is because filmmakers and writers aren’t clear about the content as the society isn’t clear. And the kind of content they appreciate, today there can’t be films made on it,” the senior artist concluded.
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