A Disturbing Visual

There is a song titled Kuththum Oosi from the film Garjanai. This song is a cabaret-style dance number within the film. It is performed by the actress Madhavi. I watched this song a few days back when I was at my grandma's house. The film was running on TV and suddenly this song appeared.

Oh my God.

I was shocked and disturbed by the visuals of the song. As usual, it was centred around a woman—her body and her expressions. The male gaze is not new to the world, nor to cinema.

In the scene, the villains have captured the hero Rajinikanth and two more female leads. I don't really know the entire storyline. But from what I saw, they were caught by the villains and injected with laughing gas.

One of the female leads has already started to laugh, whereas Rajinikanth and Geetha are just angry, their eyes filled with tears and anger.

The setting looks like a dancing hall where a number of so-called big people in society—maybe industrialists—are sitting in rows waiting for the performance.

Then comes the song Kuththum Oosi, composed by Ilaiyaraaja.

The visuals begin with a number of men who are very excited to see the woman, screaming in excitement and lust. She enters wearing very short dresses, and the camera focuses on her revealing body parts. The men around her enjoy watching her. Then guess what happens?

Like flies sitting on a banana, here the woman is pushed by the men around her. One by one they fall onto her, and a few men just cover her, with so much happiness and pride on their faces.

In the next shot, she comes out of that crowd wearing a different dress, even more revealing, symbolising that the dress she was wearing earlier has been torn away.

The choreography in the song—I don't know how they could justify it by saying it was required for the plot.

Those dance steps involve men literally being at her body parts. I cannot agree with this concept of abuse in any way. She is treated worse than a doll—touched in inappropriate ways, thrown like a ball, and played shamefully.

It ends with all the men going behind her, trying to seduce her and make her 'theirs'. 

It is really scary and painful to see how such things were normalised and enjoyed by people.

Dance number songs themselves are a problem. It is not just about dance—but the way it is captured is problematic. The camera focus, one woman surrounded by fifty men, singing in a husky, seductive tone—these are all problems.

And here the even worse thing is how something that resembles abuse and even rape is orchestrated and presented as a casual dance number.

The world has evolved, and so have people. Yet this concept seems to remain strangely stagnant, with little real change or development. The male gaze and spectacle-driven dance numbers continue to persist in cinema, often repeating the same patterns.

What has changed, perhaps, is the way we look at them. Today, more viewers are beginning to question these portrayals instead of accepting them without thought. Scenes that were once consumed as mere spectacle or entertainment are now being examined more critically.

Maybe the real shift lies here in the willingness to pause, question, and recognise what earlier generations simply watched as something normal and pleasing to the eye. Yet the voice aren't loud as everyone hasn't realised it.