Review : GIRLS WILL BE GIRLS (2024)

No one talks about the sexual awakening in a girl, including the girl herself. The silence is an acquired silence because the sexual desires among both girls and women are considered to be non-existent in a patriarchal society of which the female is an integral part. Even after she gets her periods, she is not supposed to share her desires with her closest person – her mother, a sister, a teacher or her best friend. If at all, it is treated at a suggestive level in films and plays and short stories, dwelt upon either as a negative value where the morality of the girl is in question or brushed under the patriarchal carpet by the girl’s family itself. As if the male of the species has the sole right to sexual desire. 

In this scenario, the feature film, in English-Hindi directed by Shuchi Talati a woman, broke the Lakshman Rekha to come out with Girls Will Be Girls quite brazenly without any sense of guilt, shame or embarassment but replacing this with recognition, assertion and affirmation.  This film perhaps becomes the first ever feature film made in India by an Indian director along with some international crew and a French co-producer, about an adolescent schoolgirl that deals centrally and almost exclusively with the awakening, rising, complex sexual desires and its final climax,(pun unintended) in a girl Mira, whose grades suddenly begin to fall because her total attention gets diverted to the intimate parts of her anatomy and how she can use it in sex. She wants to experience sex not only as a growing up need but as her desire to discover hidden truths about her body and its intimate parts that are never discussed even in private conversations.

Shuchi Talati, the debutant director of the film, says that she conceived the story in 2018, drawing from her own experiences as a young girl, her school in   in Gujarat, and  book series  and . The film is produced by a majority female crew in order to create a  where "girls could be girls." The female crew include producers Claire Chassange and Richa Chadha,   Jih-E Peng,  Avyakta Kapur, and  Amrita David. So, it is an international production that has made the film possible.

Mira Kishore, a high school teenager, becomes the first girl in her boarding school’s history to be appointed Head Prefect. She is also the academic topper. Amid the congratulatory cheers, Mira feels annoyed to see her mother, Anila, distributing sweets in the school premises. Mira scolds her, reminding her that parents are not allowed on campus. However, Anila, an alumnus of the same school, points out that the rule does not apply to ex-students. She takes pride in Mira’s achievement and discusses its rarity with a senior teacher, Miss Bansal.

The film is set in a  in the , and centers around teenager Mira's romance with a charming new student, with her sexual awakening, and at times her strained relationship with her over-protective mother are clear. Anila is asexually starved mother as Mira’s father lives and works in a different city so that the mother Anila (Kani Kusruti) is constantly able to supervise their growing daughter. The physical environment and the public school ambience with the children and teachers coming from affluent backgrounds invests the film with an elitist touch which might elude the mass audience. The visuals are beautiful specially when contrasted with the antiseptic aura of the classroom and the deceptive innocence of the terrace.

Mira is a virgin in the beginning of the film but is desperate to somehow strip her virginity with the help of a boyfriend. But the boys in her class do not interest her. She begins to focus her attention on a new entrant, Srinivas and much to his puzzlement, begins to use signs of being attracted though she is herself confused about whether she is really attracted to him or not. But she brings him to her home where she lives with her mother Anila, a modern, sophisticated city woman who is too possessive about her daughter. Srinivas is not handsome or has hero-like looks at all which underscores Mira’s awakening of sexuality which does not necessarily get linked to good looks and macho personality.

Srinivas is interested in astronomy and Mira uses this to pull him to her residence to know him closely. Their connection blossoms during a stargazing session, and they grow closer, sharing secrets and exchanging phone numbers. However, late-night calls with Srinivas raise Anila’s concerns, as she fears Mira might lose focus during this crucial academic year. Anila decides to meet Sri and invites him home. Despite her initial reservations, she finds him quite mature for his age and allows the two to study together at their house. Over time, the trio share lively conversations, with Anila often reminiscing about her school days.

 What is very bold about the film is Mira’s visits to the nearest internet parlour and bringing books to find out much more about the erogenous areas in her body, the parts that are more sensitive to sexual desire, and even tries to examine her private parts herself in the mirror within the privacy of her bedroom. These scenes are visually quite uncomfortable but are very bold indeed. These might induce some parts of the audience to look away but these are facts we cannot and should not avoid. She even discusses these with her best friend and with Srinivas.

This gritty and very daring film with two women in the centre, one a mother and the other, a daughter, could reach a level of excellence in narration mainly due to the outstanding performance of the actors in this strange, triangular story revolving purely around sex.

This is not only about Mira’s sexual awakening. It is also about her mother Anila, who is reasonably young and sex-starved by reason of her husband’s absence. She is married, she is the mother of a teenaged daughter and therefore, her sexual cravings are natural. What might seem not very natural is her growing proximity to Srinivas who is confused to begin with but eases out slowly.

The sub-plot describes how Anila begins to deal with the young Srinivas and to guard her daughter from getting too close to the boy, asks him to share the bed with her and sleep in her room. As if this is not enough, she locks the door from the inside leaving Mira to keep wondering about this strange behaviour by her mother and does not like it at all. There are brief scenes between Anila and Srinivas that suggest that Anila is physically attracted to her own daughter’s boyfriend and this disturbs Mira while Srinivas is terribly confused. This is the director’s clear pointing out to the sexual deprivation where a relatively young Anila is a grass widow and is deprived of a normal sex life.

But once Mira and Srinivas have had their virginity stripped in a hilly location away from their residence, the film comes to an uncertain closure. It is the brilliant performances of all the characters with an emphasis on the brilliant performances of debutant Preeti Panigrahi as Mira, Kani Kusruti as Anila and Kesav Binoy Kiron as the constantly confused Srinivas. He goes away to a different town and the so-called “affair” fades away making Girls Will Be Girls  a very bold and challenging film. Also, a too-much-in-the-face, problematic one.

*****