Through the Lens, Brightly

Women in Cinema, Women at Work

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by Shoma A. Chatterji

Type

Studies

Subject

Sociology

Keywords

women, gender

Publishing date

2023

Publisher

Primus Books

Language

English

Relative size

Physical desc.

Hardcover • 322 pages
6 x 9 ¼ inches (15.5 x 23.5 cm)

ISBN

978-93-5572-718-3

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Book Presentation:
Does the gender of a director affect your perception of a film or dictate whether or not you watch a certain movie? The Indian film industry, the biggest in the world in terms of quantity, language and culture, produces close to a thousand films a year. Yet, the presence of women in the directorial chair still appears to be a drop in the widening ocean of filmmakers in the country. Very little is known about women directors who stepped into the industry years ago and left their footsteps on the sands of reel-time.

Through the Lens, Brightly: Women in Cinema, Women at Work unearths how the 'working woman' has been presented in films directed by women. Most women directors are 'working women' themselves, with full-fledged careers of their own. Some of them also write scripts and edit their films. The volume attempts to locate whether these celluloid representations depict the empowerment of women because of their financial independence or if these women remain where they began-dependent, oppressed, marginalized and disempowered- despite their professional triumphs. The analyses of nine films by nine women directors raise some significant questions and throw up some answers, each as intriguing as the next.

About the Author:
Shoma A. Chatterji is an eminent journalist, film scholar and author based in Kolkata. A two-time National Award winner-for 'Best Film Critic' in 1991 and for 'Best Book on Cinema' in 2002-she has been on the international jury of several film festivals in India and beyond. She also pursued a postdoctoral senior fellowship from ICSSR, Delhi for research on 'The Working Woman in Bengali Cinema between 1950-2005'. Besides writing books on Indian cinema, she has also translated several Bengali short-story collections to English.

See the publisher website: Primus Books