Every May, social media in India holds its collective breath before expelling it in large quantities to critique their country women who walk the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival. They are not alone in this overkill of broadcasting who's wearing what. The rest of the world does it too. But India is alone perhaps in caring only about this performative aspect of its actors and not their actual performances. One could argue that it is because of slim pickings. Except from bright and intermittent sparks such as Anurag Kashyap and Payal Kapadia, who is this year's jury president for critics' week, the focus has been on the gowns and jewels worn on the red carpel of the Palais des Festivals because there is little else to celebrate.
It is befitting perhaps that our actors are at Cannes as clotheshorses rather than as champions of cinema. It is because the work they choose is so abysmal in its range and quality. And though they say all the right things about greater gender representation in cinema, they are unable to break out of the deadlock of male dominance back home. It is not for lack of trying. Alia Bhatt, for instance, talked about the box office performance of The Devil Wears Prada 2 as an example of women-oriented cinema doing well. Her own work is an example of the attempt to make movies that put women front and centre of the narrative whether it is Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Gangubai Kathiawadi, her Netflix production Darlings, or even her forthcoming female-led film, Alpha. But it hasn't been easy for her.
Alpha, which was meant to expand the spy franchise for Yash Raj Films, is said to be facing a crisis of faith. The producers, spooked by the success of the super violent and uber masculine Dhurandhar 1 and 2, are wondering how their formulaic film with a beach song, high wire action and wimpy nationalism will go down with audiences who have been overdosing on these dramas since Kabir Khan's Ek Tha Tiger in 2012. Nationalist espionage movies have to come wrapped in beards, biceps and blaring soundtracks now, preferably set in Pakistan. Globe-trotting spies who take breaks to wear bikinis by the Mediterranean and aim at enemies while wearing the best athleisure in the business seem to be out of fashion.
This year's festival has only two representations from India, one a short film from a student of FTII, Mehar Malhotra, and the other, the restored version of John Mathews' Amma Ariyan, which was never theatrically released when it was made in 1986, so it is only fitting that it gets a global premiere now. So where does it leave the Indian actors who get opportunities to walk the red carpet representing global beauty brands like L'Oreal? They can only be critiqued for what they say and what they wear, while Indian cinema suffers in neglect.
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan can tell youngsters like Alia Bhatt exactly how to develop a thick skin. She has spent years being attacked for her clothes, her looks and even the way she holds her daughter ever since she became an instant Cannes favourite when Devdas was screened out of competition in 2002. A year later, she was in the Cannes feature film jury, and since then she has never been absent. It is a template that others have tried to follow in India but failed, trying to become a global star on the back of their performance on the red carpet rather than on screen.
Not that Aishwarya hasn't been subjected to the same unkind scrutiny for over two decades now. At a time when movies with women, especially older women, are doing well critically and commercially, perhaps the Indian film industry and audiences that patronise its movies need to pause. At 57, Gillian Anderson is winning much acclaim for her Cannes film, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, which opened the Un Certain Regard section of the festival. The legendary Catherine Deneuve at 82 has two films at Cannes this year. Deneuve is in Asghar Farhadi's Parallel Tales, as well as with Lea Seydoux in Gentle Monster, directed by Marie Kreutzer. Both she and Anderson also happen to look dazzling on the red carpet. The Met Gala-fication of the Cannes film festival in India has truly made it seem like a fashion week in Delhi or Mumbai. Pity.
