Flipping the Script

Filmmakers Meghna Gulzar and Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari are bringing women’s stories to the forefront of Indian cinema

- RADHIKA AGRAWAL

Meghna Gulzar has always had her own voice. Although she entered the film industry in 1999 with a screenplay credit in her father’s directorial debut, Hu Tu Tu, she never tried to consciously imbibe his process. Her breakthrough came with Talvar, when she attempted to fictionalise the 2008 Noida double murder case to explore all the different theories surrounding the incident. “Even when the case broke, it grabbed my attention – and I don’t mean as a filmmaker. Every theory and piece of news turned on its head over time,” she says. She never went looking for Talvar or any of her other stories; they found their way to her. “There is an honesty in that process. I am not trying to tailor something into a film. It just happens on its own.”

THE LEARNING PROCESS

Although Raazi and Talvar were fictionalised, both films had roots in real incidents and people. And so, the journey of telling real, lived stories began way before the story of Laxmi Agarwal in Chhapaak. “I learnt all about the research, the extent to which one could fictionalise the story, and how it was unacceptable to distort facts. The best one could do was play with the timelines,” she recalls. While Malti’s character is based on Laxmi, Gulzar didn’t aim to make a biopic out of Chhapaak. Rather than telling the chronological journey of a single acid attack survivor, her focus was to create a film that spoke of acid violence and its life altering impact on those unfortunate enough to face it. This approach becomes clearer when you look at the shock ending of the film – while Malti gets her happy ending, the audience is not offered the same solace. “If everything works out, then there is nothing to think about. The fact is, everything is not fine. We are far away from fine.”