Swapaanam at Dubai International Film Festival

Gulf News

Swapaanam at Dubai International Film Festival. Indian actress Lakshmi Gopalaswamy and director Shaji N. Karun share how they collaborate to come up with a movie that dances with drama. See more at: http://gulfnews.com/gntv

Transcript

00:00I myself was very happy with my role. I think it's a truly liberal woman that I've portrayed.

00:17Truly liberal in every sense. I think it's not just Malayalam cinema, it's everywhere.

00:21Now I feel as a woman and somebody who has also studied gender issues, I think people

00:27normally understand or people talk about women's liberation and feminism in a very superficial

00:33sense. Here is a woman who is dressed in a settumund all the time, who is dressed in

00:38a very simple cotton saree all the time, but she is truly emancipated in her mind. As somebody

00:46who follows, who fights, who breaks away from conventions, from traditions, follows her

00:51heart and her mind and I think that's the beauty of this role.

00:57Many of the films portray women in a dynamic and in one way a role which needs to be discussed

01:07and with a lot of attention. But unfortunately I think dress also doesn't bring in the limelight

01:13for that reason. And here I think the reason for an average filmgoer from India is now

01:20becoming more than an entertainment, it's sheer entertainment. But then the cultural

01:25side of the film generally is being overlooked or heard. And that's happening quite often

01:31from the last ten years and we continue. We don't want to get disappointed for a good

01:36reason, but we wanted to say certain things through our film which happened in this film.

01:40This is one example where cinema as a mass media is so powerful and I think it can be

01:47a catalyst to society's progress. So I feel this doesn't come very often. I would definitely

01:54like to say that. These kind of roles don't come very often. And I would also like to

01:58speak not just about my role, but all the women in this film. I think that's what a

02:04great director is about. They're all very well etched out. They all have a strong mind

02:09of their own. They have their own quirks and their own opinions, but they have their own

02:14mind. She's my actress who gave me enough blood and shades to my character which I thought

02:22in my mind. Right. So I had support for her. I was actually itching to dance, but on the

02:28other side I'm breaking a lot of stereotypes for myself because when they say Lakshmi,

02:32it's like Lakshmi the dancer, but here it's only the actor. Very often I felt sir could

02:37be my dance teacher. And if there was a passage, he would say I want anger here, I want it

02:42to turn into sadness in these two lines. And then I want it to turn to resignation.

02:48He would have worked out the emotion line by line, very much like a lyrics that I'm

02:52dancing to. So I really felt I was under some great, here kind of a director acting guru.

03:00But it was really, that was the feeling I got every time I was working with sir.

03:06Mani, why are you so sad? Is it because you're waiting to be with him? Or that you're in

03:22front of... Why? You're beautiful. You're a poetry in motion.

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