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A horrible news on Twitter caught my attention a few days ago. Women workers in a factory in Tamil Nadu would be forced by the management to swallow untagged pills to reduce menstrual pain so they could go to the bathroom less often and spend free time at work in an office. terrible example of badist work. exploitation. Something similar happens in Leila – women in a social welfare center are drugged to avoid questioning the status quo, in this series of Netflix that unfolds in a "foreseeable future" in India. Now, what else have they said about dystopia as a mirror of current reality?
According to the 2017 novel by Prayaag Akbar, Leila is an uncomfortable watch, largely because what happens during this six-part series is incredibly close to what we are currently observing in India. . Well, at least part of it.
Adapted by Urmi Juvekar and partly directed by filmmaker Deepa Mehta who also acts as creative producer, Leila – although taking place in 2047 – is a zeitgeist of the time in which we live in or are likely to mow. A world in which an oppressive socio-politico-religious order reigns, with the state monitoring the movements of its citizens 24/7, the population being ghettoised in communities controlled on the basis of religion, caste and religion. allegiance to the state and to whom this totalitarianism is questioned is considered a traitor and accused of sedition.
Leila is carved in the same fabric (up to the unmistakable red suit that women wear in both series) as The Handmaid's Tale – The Margaret Atwood's dystopian novel, which is now a popular television series and focuses on the enslavement of women in a patriarchal society.
Leila opens with a shock. At home swimming in the pool at home, a family of three – Rizwan Choudhary (Rahul Khanna), his Hindu wife Shalini (Huma Qureshi) and his three-year-old daughter Leila – are attacked by militia. The husband is lynched, the woman is imprisoned and the girl is taken to an unknown place. Their crime? At a time when the water war is at the center of almost every conflict, the affluent family is punished for using sneaky means to buy what is a scarce resource. But under the obvious reason is another much more sinister. The marriage between a Hindu and a Muslim is frowned upon in Aryavarta – this is what is called the new extremist state to Hindu rule – and the half-blooded children are described as "impure" and are peddled to prospective adopters. Leila revives the horrors – real and imagined – of Shalini's journey through patriarchy, slavery, enslavement and hatred of the community to find her daughter.
The Netflix series takes the seed of the book and transmits it. a fresh spin. While the book mainly offers commentaries on clbad, caste, bad and privilege, the series also addresses the normalization of oppression and the blind worship of political leaders, in this case a deified dictator named Joshi ( Sanjay Suri). "My lineage is my destiny. I am blessed to be born in this country, "are the" faithful "citizens obliged to parrot daily. In the book, Shalini seeks to find Leila for 16 years while only two years in the series.
Unconscious of his own conscience, Leila is not easy. The treatment of women – an ideal woman is a "domestic goddess, worships her family and spends her life serving," says a poster on the wall of the welfare center, will make you cringe. Detainees, all considered sinners who must pbad a "purity test," are tortured mentally and physically, and any act of rebellion is severely punished. In one scene, a woman is married to a dog for refusing to comply with the rules. In this survival game, the women turned against each other, despite the same fate.
Even though she is banished to the labor camp after failing the purity test, Shalini frees herself from the chains of the oppressive social center and it is from episode 3 that Leila makes sense as Shalini says find ways – sometimes with an ally, sometimes not – to search for his daughter. Along the way, she thwarts surveillance systems and discovers a political plot.
The drama as well as the arc of character of its players can be uneven over the six episodes, but Leila marks a #win with its atmospheres. Johan Heurlin Aidt's lens briefly captures Aryavarta's cloudy visual palette with its apocalyptic gray sky, hazy streets, slums and garbage piled up in dizzying mountains. Even the rain here – caused by severe pollution – is black in color. The disparity between the privileged and the poor is clearly stated.
Huma Qureshi is at the center of Leila less disguised, her face concealed by uncomfortable close-ups, probably to reflect Shalini's claustrophobia. The actor invests Shalini with unwavering determination and a palpable vulnerability. She wears the series on her shoulders and gives us moods and moments – this scene where she realizes who really orchestrated her misfortune is heartbreaking – who stays with the viewer. Basanti Rank The Siddharth man, as Shalini's state-appointed guardian, Bhanu, is an ambiguous character and the actor plays it with an appropriate dose of mystery and sensitivity. Rahul Khanna Rice appears from time to time in the subconscious of Shalini and is strictly disposable.
Leila ends on a cliffhanger that sets the tone for season 2. In the end, the series leaves us with a dazzling question – and that makes goose bumps crack. Could this dystopia become our reality?
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