Shahid Kapoor on misogyny allegations: Kabir Singh was behaving badly ‘across the board’
The actor breaks his silence about the critical backlash surrounding his latest hit
Shahid Kapoor has finally addressed the criticism surrounding his latest hit, Kabir Singh. In an interview, the actor spoke about the ‘aggressive’ backlash faced by the film. “The reason I didn't do an interview is that I felt everyone was very aggressive. I didn't think it was healthy. I didn't want to come out attacking anybody. I didn't want to come out defending a film. I wanted to speak about a film like a film should be spoken about,” he told Bollywood Hungama.
The actor called out film critics for applauding complex characters portrayed in Hollywood films but not in Bollywood. On allegations of endorsing misogyny and violence against women, Shahid contented that his character, Kabir, was misbehaved ‘across the board’ and wasn’t prejudiced toward his girlfriend alone.
“He (Kabir) only has one problem. There is nothing else wrong with Kabir. He has an anger management problem. When he gets angry he messes everything up—whether it is the love of his life or his family or career or best friend. Otherwise, there are a lot of positive qualities in the character,” the actor said.
In a recent interview with Film Companion, director Sandeep Reddy Vanga had defended the scene where Kabir slaps Preeti (Kiara Advani). “When you are deeply in love and deeply connected to a woman, and vice versa, there’s a lot of honesty in it. if you don’t have the liberty of slapping each other, then I don’t see anything there,” the filmmaker had said.
Sharing his thoughts on the scene, Shahid expressed, “If Kabir hadn't slapped Preeti, would everything else that he did be okay? Because he slapped the girl, you feel that is unacceptable and that Kabir Singh is unacceptable. We want you to feel this is unacceptable, that his behaviour has gone beyond control.”
Comparing the critical washout of the film with its popular success, Sahid said this is the first time the “reviewers have been reviewed by the audience.”
Kabir Singh has crossed Rs. 270 crore at the Indian box office. A Tamil version of the film, titled Adithya Varma, is scheduled to release later this year.
