Having several women on a film set is a big change in Indian cinema: Film critic Anupama Chopra

For three decades now, Anupama Chopra — one of India’s top film critics and founder of Film Companion — has been critiquing Indian cinema and interviewing the who’s who of the film industry. 

Starting in the late 80s as a film journalist, Anupama recollects an era of Indian films when the actress and the hairdresser were the only women on a film set of 150 people. 

“Coming from that experience to now, where there are women in every field, and having women who will question biases and discriminatory behaviour, is a huge move. Today, leading actors Deepika Padukone, Anushka Sharma, and Alia Bhatt are talking about issues like pay parity or differences of food served for different people on a film set, among others is a big change,” she tells HerStory in an interview. 

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She adds, “Women never spoke about these issues no matter how powerful they were. They didn’t get into those things. They were there to push their careers and get the right roles, but now women are in different areas of work. They are all hyphenated, and so I think we’ve come a long way.”

While things have moved on in the film industry, the advent of streaming services hugely contributed to this change towards wider gender inclusion. 

With OTT platforms, women directors, producers, and crew members have found better choices and freedom. In fact, women belonging to varying age groups are getting far deeper roles to play on-screen. 

“As much as I am thrilled to see Alia leading a film like Gangubai Kathiawadi to hopefully Rs 100 crore in the middle of a pandemic, the truth is, it’s for the women of a certain age,” says Anupama. 

She adds that women of slightly older age don’t get these roles and opportunities in the Hindi film industry, but they do on streaming services.

She believes actors like Madhuri Dixit, Sushmita Sen, Lara Dutta, etc., who didn’t fit Hindi cinema’s idea of a mainstream heroine — but also aren’t old enough to be white-head mothers — were just cast away.  

“Hindi cinema didn’t know what to do with them. But streaming has given a different narrative to these women and built shows around them,” Anupama shares her thesis.

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Entrepreneurial journey

Besides being a top-notch film critic, Anupama also founded Film Companion — a digital media platform that publishes in-depth film reviews, critiques, analyses, interviews, etc. 

She latched on to the digital wave right at the very beginning when media companies were figuring out the online ecosystem. 

Talking about the company, Anupama recalls how she didn’t put much thought into it at the beginning. 

“My show with Star World had just ended, and my husband [Vidhu Vinod Chopra] said I should think about going digital because a film review should be available at any time and should not be restricted to appointment viewing. And, that’s literally the only plan we had at that time,” she laughs.

Anupama launched Film Companion, along with film critic, Baradwaj Rangan. 

“It was just the fact that we knew how to make video content. I loved watching the movies and reviewing them, so it has been purely led by that passion. We are far more organised now,” she says.