Text and Context: Why is Tamil cinema so reluctant to explore varied shades of romance?
The term ‘niche’ is often relegated to only a doomed romance or a well-fought-for relationship between two starkly different characters. Seldom have creators, in the last few years, explored the crevices that divide two people who carry billions of dreams and desires
(Originally published in The Hindu on September 23, 2023)
Greta Lee’s Nora turns her back to Teo Yoo’s Hae Sung and to a life she could no longer even daydream, and walks back to John Magaro’s Arthur, a life she was gifted with. The rain outside as I watched the scene might just be the tears of all star-crossed souls. And hours after watching Past Lives, a romantic could only sigh at the cinematic wonder and whisper, “How could something seem so effortless?” Back home, meanwhile, a believer in Tamil cinema raises a suspicion, of what seems like a growing distrust in exploring niche conflicts in a relationship, with creators always opting for a more mainstream approach to silver screen romances.
The death of old-school romance
With creators struggling to understand the sensibilities of Gen Z audiences who are quick to conclude any old-school displays of emotions, like love, as ‘cringe-worthy,’ the long-gone but still dampening fatigue for old-school romance has evidently affected the way creators look at relationship dramas. It is as if they no longer see value in exploring the vastness that is a human’s affair with another. While we have seen many love stories this year that sometimes teased a niche conflict such as in Dada, Good Night, and segments of Modern Love: Chennai, it becomes apparent that even though good love stories are in regular supply, there has been no mainstream attempt to evaluate if there’s an audience for a Normal People-like series, even on streaming platforms.
Often, ‘niche’ is relegated to only a doomed romance or a well-fought-for relationship between two starkly different characters, but seldom in the last few years have creators tapped into the crevices that divide two people, of eight billion, who carry billions of dreams and desires that make them. So when a character like Anu from Good Night tugs at your heartstrings simply by holding back her tears on seeing her husband lose himself over something she has no control over, it comes as a breath of fresh air. Good Night majorly resists the urge to let the unusual situation — that of a man suffering from sleep apnea — take the spotlight by disguising itself as a romance drama. The conflict becomes a tool, a necessary one, to explore something personal but also universal.
Sometimes a writer brings in something stunningly nuanced but in a film that lacks the gravitas or has no intent of doing anything niche about it. Dada is one such film; for all that it got right, it seems to have strangely decided that perhaps its two lead characters didn’t need the ‘interruption’ of their child, until the climax, to tell their story. In a film like Peranbu, which isn’t about a romantic relationship, or for an older example, Kannathil Muthamittaal, the child becomes both the avenue and the bridge to two souls while also retaining their own inherent value in the story — whether it was the experience of being an adopted child or a child on the spectrum.
Read the full story here: Why is Tamil cinema so reluctant to explore varied shades of romance?
