Bollywood And Hollywood’s Most Dynamic Female Leads; Illustrated

“Bachao bachao!” screams every woman at some point in a classic Bollywood film, when the rugged masculine lead arrives in no time to save her. Even though these movies are hugely enjoyed by the masses, we have, somewhere down the line, come to terms with the fact that women are not only repressed in our society but also in films. But there’s a new era of filmmaking which has thoughtfully reconsidered the importance of better and more accurate representation of women. Over the past few years, Bollywood has opened its silver screen to discuss women in the light of sexuality, rights, independence; thus, questioning their current position in India.

In this vein, young artist Shivani Gorle has found the best way to celebrate this new age of storytelling through her colourful and vivid illustrated series aptly titled ‘Queens on Screen’. You might have already heard of or seen this powerful graphic art surfacing on your Facebook feed, but sadly not enough number of times, so here we are, sharing them to make up for the count. Gorle, a 21-year-old graphic artist, has handpicked the most dynamic list of female leads from both Bollywood and Hollywood - putting them together with her craft and giving us the right reasons to be thankful for their zestful presence in films.

“Women have come a long way in cinema - from being the dumb girl to being a sex object. I feel filmmakers and scriptwriters now play special attention to create well rounded characters. They are no longer created on the bases of their gender, but on how human they are. Their flaws, their stories and their experiences is what makes up the film rather than their societal position,” explains Shivani to Homegrown.

Her motivation to create this series stemmed out of sheer curiosity. When she was on her Netflix account, Gorle observed that there was a special category called ‘Strong Female Leads’. “Why do women need a separate category?” she asked herself. To understand women’s special position in our world today, she decided to create a series that would bring more recognition to women who fall under this category.

Although, she didn’t follow the list Netflix had curated on its website, she decided to put down the leads that impacted her the most. She says, “Mastani is my favorite because I find her character extremely fascinating. I picked all of them from films I watched myself. For some, I even re-watched the films to pay more attention to their dialogues or read between the lines to have a better understanding of what made them so dynamic.”

There is no end in sight for Shivani’s series as of now. She aspires to take more inspiration from vernacular films from Maharashtra and Southern India. “For me, diversity is as important as feminism. I would like to have women of all different kinds to be part of this series,” she adds. With that, we hope as Shivani’s list becomes longer, more filmmakers continue to boost this era, where art that doesn’t confine the social representation of the sexes - as proved by her artist herself below.