NZIFF Autumn Events Review: ‘The World Before Her’

The World Before Her is a disturbing document of the role of women in modern India.

The film juxtaposes two wildly different versions of Indian womanhood. Ruhi is a small town beauty who has managed to win herself a place in the Miss India contest. Prachi works and teaches at a training camp run by Durga Vahini, the women’s branch of what is commonly known as the Hindu Taliban.

The contrasts between the two worlds are stark. The Miss India contestants are forced into situations that are pointless at best, exploitative at worst. In order to judge who has the best legs, the women are forced to wear sacks over their head and torso, leaving only their limbs exposed. Yet all the girls participating seem to believe winning will open doors for them, offer them a chance at a better, more independent life.

Even more terrifying is the indoctrination of young girls into a world of violence and religious fanaticism. In order to save ‘their’ India, the girls are taught to shoot rifles and to fight hand to hand. How their country is being taken is left vague, but it’s very clear that the ‘who’ are Muslims and Christians.

Life at the camp is dusty and spare with only the necessities and no luxuries. In a different world, the Miss India contestants are given Botox and stay in high-class Bombay hotels. The contrast is not just in their locations, but also in their abilities to see themselves clearly. Ruhi is gorgeous and expects the world to be kind to her. She knows she will be married in the future. Conversely, Prachi is uninterested in marriage and is all too aware that she’s unattractive, even mannish in her appearance. Yet according to her father, marriage is her duty, as is bearing grandsons.

Prachi’s father is perhaps the villain in the piece. He admits to beating and even maiming his daughter, but is convinced that doing so is his right. What’s more horrifying is that Prachi agrees with this statement, claiming that she belongs to her father, like a stick of furniture or soiled linen.

And in a country where thousands of girl-children are aborted or killed at birth, it is little wonder that girls live their lives grateful to be kept and given the opportunity to grow up. A former Miss India speaks of her mother as a saint when she explains that her mother left her father because he wanted to kill her for being another girl.

I found this a deeply affecting piece of cinema. Perhaps most tragic is this: all the women interviewed stated they were better off than their mothers, that India was growing and changing in the way it treats women – yet the images on screen scream to us how wrong they are. In a devastating scene, Prachi reveals she knows she’s fighting for a system that wants to oppress her. But she can’t do anything else because she’s a woman. Young Ruhi, blinded by the glitz and glamour of the stage lights and sequins, can’t even see that she’s just a pawn in the patriarchal machine.

8/10

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