Curated for Pride Library, University of Western Ontorio, Canada
Copyright Sridhar Rangayan, 2009
Please write to us for permission to use any text on this site
DISCLAIMER: All interpretations and readings is by the author. All the images and videos on this site have been used only for reference, collated from sources on the internet.
CREDITS
Title: Gulabi Aaina
English Title: The Pink Mirror
Year: 2003
Language: Hindi
Subtitle: English
Genre: Short Feature
Duration: 40mins
Director: Sridhar Rangayan
SYNOPSIS
The Pink Mirror pits two Indian drag queens against a westernized gay teenager in a battle to woo a handsome hunk. It's a clash of the east and west. Who will win? The drag queens, who are expert in the art of seduction with their wit, innuendo and cunning or the young teenager who is saucy, slutty and sly? Underneath the campy humorous exterior, the film is an exploration of the Indian gay landscape and understanding of the deep, humanly tender bondings that exist between drag queens in India who form unique, non-patriarchal families. Using the Bollywood soap idiom of song, dance and drama and for the first time in the Indian drag queens' very own language, Hindi, the film also explores other veiled issues related to the Indian gay community: the lurking threat of HIV/AIDS.
QUEER NOTES
India�s first film on drag queens is the first ever film to sensitively portray Indian transsexuals who were ridiculed in every mainstream film or caricaturized. It also uses the native tongue of �kothis� (Indian transsexuals) without shying away from their liberal usage of profanity and expression of desire. The film remains banned in India by the Censor Board. This is also perhaps the only Indian film where all the characters are queer.
ACTOR/S IN QUEER ROLE
Edwin Fernandes as Shabbo and Ramesh Menon as Bibbo (transsexuals)
Rishi Raj as Mandy and Deepak Sonawane as Bipin (gay)
Rufy Baqal as Samir (bisexual)
LINKS
Imdb: www.imdb.com/title/tt0386499/
queer portrayals in Indian films