Shuchi Talati's coming-of-age drama screened at the St. John's International Women's Film Festival (SJIWFF)
CBC
Fri, October 25, 2024
In Shuchi Talati's film Girls Will Be Girls, shame around female bodies and sexuality is evaluated through the eyes of a 16-year-old student at a Himalayan boarding school. Starring Preeti Panigrahi, Kani Kusruti and Kesav Binoy Kiron the film, which won the World Cinema - Dramatic Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival and was screened during the St. John's International Women's Film Festival (SJIWFF), is an interesting look at a mother-daughter relationship.
Mira (Panigrahi) is the first girl to hold the position of head prefect in her school, something the teenage boys aren't particularly thrilled about. She's tasked with being the student who helps to enforce the school uniform dress code and other rules.
This model student soon has a crush on classmate Sri (Kiron), but the teachers at this strict school are very much against girls dating. The female students are encouraged to not speak to boys "more than necessary."
As her feelings for Sri get stronger, Mira's mother Anila (Kusruti) has her daughter invite Sri to their home, where she tells him Mira's academics can't suffer and they can't be more than friends.
There's already a bit of tension between Mira and her mother, with Anila seen as the "cool mom" by her friends, but things take a turn when Anila's position as a supervisor between Mira and Sri seems to shift. Anila starts giving Sri more attention than her daughter, having more private conversations with him. It's like Mira and Anila are competing for Sri's attention.
Fri, October 25, 2024
In Shuchi Talati's film Girls Will Be Girls, shame around female bodies and sexuality is evaluated through the eyes of a 16-year-old student at a Himalayan boarding school. Starring Preeti Panigrahi, Kani Kusruti and Kesav Binoy Kiron the film, which won the World Cinema - Dramatic Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival and was screened during the St. John's International Women's Film Festival (SJIWFF), is an interesting look at a mother-daughter relationship.
Mira (Panigrahi) is the first girl to hold the position of head prefect in her school, something the teenage boys aren't particularly thrilled about. She's tasked with being the student who helps to enforce the school uniform dress code and other rules.
This model student soon has a crush on classmate Sri (Kiron), but the teachers at this strict school are very much against girls dating. The female students are encouraged to not speak to boys "more than necessary."
As her feelings for Sri get stronger, Mira's mother Anila (Kusruti) has her daughter invite Sri to their home, where she tells him Mira's academics can't suffer and they can't be more than friends.
There's already a bit of tension between Mira and her mother, with Anila seen as the "cool mom" by her friends, but things take a turn when Anila's position as a supervisor between Mira and Sri seems to shift. Anila starts giving Sri more attention than her daughter, having more private conversations with him. It's like Mira and Anila are competing for Sri's attention.
Girls Will Be Girls
Girls Will Be Girls is very much a quiet film, in the best way possible. While the film takes a strong stance against the long history of women feeling like their sexuality is shameful, it's delicate in it's storytelling by leaning into the silence and lingering on the expression of emotions.
What Girls Will Be Girls does is eliminate the shame that comes with growing up and evaluating sexual desires, from Mira practicing kissing on her hand, to researching how to have sex.
As we get into the relationship between Anila and Sri, the story is positioned in a way that suggests that a line could be crossed, but never is. It's awkward to watch, but Talati approaches this element of the story from a place of empathy for Anila, who is seemingly a bit envious that her daughter is being afforded freedoms as a teen that she never had.
Talati also never loses sight of putting a mirror up to normalized sexism. For example, when Mira tells the school principal that boys are taking pictures of girls walking up the stairs in their school uniform skirts, her principal's reaction is to tell Mira to ignore them, and to make sure the girls have longer skirts on.
It's a complex balance that Talati has to strike in this film, with the story occasionally feeling murky in its execution, starting off with a slower pace than you may want, but nonetheless, it captures a uniquely raw vulnerability on screen.
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