22 FEMALE KOTTAYAM & mass consciousness

New generation movies are the trend making ones in the present Malayalam film scenario. 22fk is one among them and it is said to have changed the whole fate and face of Malayalam cinema. It is directed by Ashiq Abu after his failed attempt of Daddy Cool and a so called masterpiece Salt and Pepper. It became very popular even before its release, through Facebook and such social networking sites. It has got its market under the label “a feminist film”. Advertisements for this film created a false consciousness even in a highly patriarchal society that this film puts forward a novel theme that promotes the empowerment of women through a ‘true’ feminist line of attack. The advertisements are intentionally made very realistic and are naturalised, taking characters from the real life situations. The characters are ordinary working class women. They are presented as handling the nuisance makers (men) in the street, bus and such public places that gives a false impression that the movie is greatly against male domination and is greatly in support of feminism and women empowerment. But the film lets down all the anticipations and deceitfully follows the patriarchal conventions of Malayalam film.

The marketing of the film itself is in a certain way that establishes a mass consciousness about the film that it is something revolutionary especially in the context of a patriarchal society. So everyone who is attracted by the advertisements goes to theatre having a false consciousness in her/his mind that the film is something that breaks all the norms and conditions established by traditional film makers. Director is very conscious in making the rendering of the film as per the constructed belief of the audience that he is well aware of.

 The significant participation of the film discourse in creating an exploitative imaginative world and thereby shaping the mass consciousness conducive to exploitative practices becomes a topic of political and cultural interest to anyone who is sensitive and political. 

Most films or the industry itself tend to provide an ideological presentation of social issues often assuming postures of compromise with the existing social structure. They seem to imagine and present an alternative to the decaying society but they mostly end up supporting the existing social structure, systems and values. Instead of an attempt to mould a new consciousness, films at large create a mindset in the viewers to adjust with the present social set up. What 22fk, a so called revolutionary film, does is not different.

22fk presents a ‘not so feminine’ female character Tessa. K. Abraham. She is almost an orphan who was brought up as a ‘Kottayam Christian female’. She is a stereotyped city girl in all her manners and appearance in the film. The film highlights certain aspects of her life and says that a bold and modern woman is like this. She is a nurse who wants to go to Canada for a better future of her professional life. Cyril is just an intruder who comes in between Tessa and her dreams. The film wants to put him in that way (as a secondary character) in order to make it female-centric but it craftily diverts from the path because a commercial film like this gets its market only if it satisfies certain norms and conditions of the society that shape the mindset of the viewers. So Cyril is glorified in many minute parts and in the sum total of the film itself. For example, there is a scene in which Tessa and her friends pass a comment on the buttocks of Cyril and make him embarrassed but the next moment he comes back with a counter blast that has got maximum applause from the viewers.

The film also raises the question of ‘virginity’. Virginity is something attributed only to women in a patriarchal society. This film presents a woman who is ‘dare enough’ to say that she is not a virgin. This declaration is welcomed as a big revolution in the Malayalam film history because in a traditional way all films presented and are presenting virgin females as heroines. But what actually happens in this film is far behind this appraisal. At a point where the relationship between Tessa and Cyril starts, she is ‘confessing’ that she is not a virgin. Otherwise, why should she say it to Cyril if she doesn’t consider her virginity as something precious? She does not ask anything about Cyril and he does not say about himself too. So it is the patriarchal consciousness that makes Tessa to confess on her ‘impurity’ and it is sure that a Malayali viewer’s mass consciousness could never have digested the film if Cyril is a ‘pure’ man (without a touch of villainy) throughout the film. But the film is accepted and praised because the heroine is morally ‘better’ than the hero.

The film has intentionally used the Kottayam slang of Tessa seemingly to add humour to some scenes. But where and when it comes is to be noted carefully. Whenever Tessa speaks about her life and future very seriously Cyril makes fun of her ‘funny’ slang by demeaning her serious talks. This is not criticised by those who praise this film as a feminist film because everyone’s unconscious mind is shaped by the mass consciousness that women are not supposed to think and act higher than men do. Men are to decide the future of women as per the constructed belief. Cyril’s eagerness in correcting Tessa (even though she is right in her own way) clearly shows that.

The two main male characters other than Cyril are Hegde and D K. Hegde is the one who raped Tessa brutally and got killed by herself. D K is the man who offers his help to Tessa in her plan to kill her rivals and what he asks instead of the help is her own body. After all the revenging scenes the film clearly underlines the fact that no woman can react to the injustices shown to her, without the help of a man. Whom she depends is the more interesting thing. D K (/ decay) is a man of the ‘generous’ policy that love women and own them. If Hegde has the colonial policy of direct attack then D K follows the imperial way of taming the minds and conquering them. Obviously D K is more dangerous than Hegde in the ideological level. But the film kills Hegde and leaves D K harmless. That again shows that the film is very much anti-women.

In the last part of the film also Cyril dominates Tessa and is given applauses even after his castration. She is corrected again and her revenge seems to be nothing to Cyril. There is an intentional dialogue by Cyril at this part – “you are the real woman”. Why does Tessa need such a certificate, that too from a castrated male? This is only to satisfy the mass consciousness which gives certificates to women in various forms.

Saying that it denies hero domination 22fk presents an alter hero figure who is very much different from the usual heroes. Labelling it as a feminist film is only a way for its promotion. Market wants everything including feminism as a show off and a commercial world supports all new ideas and trends not to promote it for any good of the society but to glorify and idealize them and thus keeping away from reality. Then only capitalism can resist challenging changes and revolutions from the mass. So capitalism leads society through its own way by maintaining the mass consciousness using its tools such as film and other art forms. So 22fk also is not different in maintaining the established mass consciousness of society, mostly about women, by keeping their rank just below men always.