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Dorothy (2026)
Director: Karthik Subbaraj
This movie recently kicked up a storm in Tamil Nadu. Reviews are mixed, but both sides are strongly opinionated. One camp is adamant that such movies should be banned, calling them decadent and arguing that the moviemakers aim to normalise a deviant way of life. Another argues that free speech should have no limits and that all movies can be produced. Malaysia has decided to ban it outright as it involves LGBT issues.
The truth, after watching the movie, is far from that. The film is high quality, capturing the realism of a typical 80s Tamil village drama, minus the silver-screen razzmatazz. In this rough, tough, brash environment, two young boys find friendship at school. Kartik, the newcomer to the village school, is bullied, and Subbu, a pint-sized boy who thinks he is Bruce Lee reincarnate, comes to his rescue. They become close buddies. They spend a lot of time in each other's households. Subbu's father is a casteist but eventually allows Kartik to eat and hang around their home.
Subbu and Kartik grow up to be best friends and become Subbu's father's henchmen. They are feared by villagers. Everything goes well until Subbu's elder brother marries Dorothy, a girl from Kerala. The two grow close to Dorothy. Subbu is often seen in the kitchen near Dorothy, doing chores.
One day, they find Dorothy hanging in the centre of the house. It is obvious there is foul play, probably staged by Subbu's father and Dorothy's husband, but the police deemed it a clear-cut suicide. Subbu gets very depressed. Out of the blue, Subbu shaves clean and walks out of his house, dressed as a woman. His father, a true-blooded macho character immersed in a muscularly toxic environment, would not going to take this lying down. Earlier, Kartik, who absconded from the village after killing another villager, is summoned by Subbu's father to kill his best friend, Subbu.
The rest of the story follows Kartik, now a cross-border lorry driver, as he hunts down Subbu and gathers the courage to pull the trigger on his friend. Kartik is slowly schooled in Subbu's hardship as he tries to conform to societal pressures and starts empathising with his difficulties. He arranges for a dead orphan's body to double as Subbu's alleged dead body to convince his father that Kartik had completed his mission. Subbu is allowed to do whatever it takes to live among transgender people and pursue whatever she wants.
Most viewers could stomach it up to that point. What happens next is what most viewers could not stomach. Kartik has a 'When Harry Met Sally' moment when he confides in a fellow henchman and confidante, Vadivu, about the turn of events with Subbu. Vadivu convinces Kartik that what he feels for Subbu is not friendship, but romantic love. Kartik agrees and makes a dash to meet his beau at the climax in another town, rushing through the crowd and, caught in an embrace, kissing another man for the first time in Indian cinema. End.
The director asserts that it is not his intention to normalise deviant sexual practices but rather to highlight the difficulties transgender people face. He also wanted to highlight the toxic environment the marginalised live in.
I suppose the filmmaker added the last scene as an afterthought to stir the hornet's nest among conservative parts of society. Anyway, controversies turn heads. It attracts curious minds, people talk, and that generates publicity, which translates into box office returns.
By the way, I was impressed by the film's superior quality of the filmmaking. Besides the excellent recreation of a 1990s Tamil Nadu village, the acting of every other actor and the supporting cast is beyond comparison. Sassanth, who plays Subbu, did a fantastic job transitioning into a female role. It was indistinguishable from a cis-woman. His gestures and mannerisms are impeccable. The fighting scenes are quite realistic, minus the gore, which seems to be the trend these days. Good movie, 8/10.
The talking points here are twofold. Firstly, is there no place for platonic love? Can't two people of different genders be friendly without romantic love getting intertwined? Must physical love be inserted? Secondly, all future brotherly relationships, the ones we call 'brothers of different mothers', may risk being labelled gay relationships!
Farouk Gulsara (asokansham@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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