There has been a lot of discourse over female objectification after the release of Peddi, starring Ram Charan and directed by Buchi Babu Sana. Audiences have been quite critical of how Peddi's makers treated Janhvi Kapoor's character in the film. According to many of them, the hero's gaze towards her character is 'crass' and 'vulgar'. While Buchi Babu Sana apologised for the portrayal, acknowledged the criticism and promised to remove the contentious sequences from the film, the discourse has only become more intense with actors from other industries speaking about it.
Meanwhile, time is ripe to remind the audience of one of the rare occasions in Indian cinema where a film objectified the hero through the female gaze. We are talking about 2012's Aiyyaa, directed by Sachin Kundalkar and starring Rani Mukerji and Prithviraj Sukumaran.
In an old conversation with Film Companion South, Prithviraj spoke about how Aiyyaa explored male objectification. He said, "Indian cinema is unfortunately so used to objectifying women. And we just turned the tables, and said, 'Okay. Now the lust and everything is with the woman, and let her objectify the man.' And that was interesting."
Prithviraj Sukumaran also quipped, "I loved the fact that Rani Mukerji was lusting after me in the film. I was and still am a big fan of Rani." Prithviraj described the film as a "wild, sort of a satirical take on a lot of Bollywood cliches."
Around the same time, Prithviraj said that he would not star in misogynistic films. However, the actor-filmmaker faced much flak when his directorial venture, Lucifer, had a so-called 'item number' song. In multiple interviews, the actor said that such songs with female stars in glamorous costumes do not amount to misogyny, although he would not like to get back at audiences for thinking that it does. At the same time, the actor said that he would not want to star in films where the heroine falls in love with the hero, even after he treats her badly.
