Cinema is not only a powerful tool of leisure, entertainment, and culture in society but importantly a reflection, even if sometimes partial or skewed,  of social reality. Films also have the potential to start a conversation and challenge dominant ideas in public discourse. Cinema has the power to initiate new ideas in society. As a unique form of art, it has specific narrative and representational aspects. Sexuality is a taboo topic and not surprisingly a taboo in cinematic representation too.  Although significant changes are taking place, heteronormativity continues to be the standardized and the dominant norm of conducting sexual behaviour in society.  Other expressions of sexuality are too often seen as deviant. Representations of sexuality in films are predominantly heteronormative and do not always highlight the deviations in sexual orientations and expressions.  Biased or stereotypical perceptions about alternative sexualities continue to be depicted in the visual media. Therefore, Gender, Sexuality, and Indian Cinema: Queer Visuals edited by Srija Sanyal and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing in 2023, is a good read for researchers who want to understand and explore the complex relationship between cinema and sexuality.

The book is divided into ten chapters with an introduction written by Srija Sanyal. The introductory part traces the representational genealogy of sexual minorities in Indian cinema with a focus on alternative cinema that was ahead of its time in its fine and authentic portrayal of homosexuality. Each chapter of the book has tried to build theoretical discourses on questions of gender and sexuality in the cinematic narratives. The intent appears to construct, deconstruct, reinterpret, and assign new meanings to the polysemic nature of sexuality in the media texts. The later chapters of the book have tried to deconstruct the idea of heterosexuality and heteronormativity using the visual texts, to create a niche for the non-conforming sexual identities and their lived experiences of living in a heteronormative world.

The first chapter deals with the idea of ‘consent’ in homosexual relationships which rests on an assumption of heteronormative standards of society. Using the context of two LGBTQ films, the chapter seeks to move beyond the traditional understanding of consent as a mere ‘yes’ or ‘no’ and to understand its nuances and details which are just not tied to the positive affirmation of sexual acts. At the same time, it attempts to understand that certain kinds of sexual acts and consent function differently in homosexual and heterosexual relationships. Therefore, what takes place is a reinterpretation of the concept of consent and sexuality from the non-normative heteronormative frameworks of society.

The second chapter deals with the act of translation of gender identities in the Malayalam film Vaisali in English, which has offered new perspectives on the questions of the fluidity of gender and sexual identity which had been rendered invisible due to the heteronormative nature of the queer cinematic narratives. The third chapter deals with the masculinization of queer bodies and female queer in the Malayalam cinema and the dominant trends of seeing queer bodies as ‘abnormal’ and reducing the queer person to an object of contempt, laughter, and mockery.

The fourth chapter deals with acts of ‘voyeurism’ and issues of privacy in the queer revelations’ moments in media texts, which in practice reflect the hegemonic normative perspectives of Indian society. The fifth chapter analyses the inherent heterosexual, masculinist and misogynistic nature of cricket by using the Amazon Prime series Inside Edge.  The primary homosexual lead, who captained the Indian cricket team and his subsequent efforts of coming out “serves as an attempt to deconstruct the compulsory heterosexuality of cricketing culture” (p. 90). There is a queering of Indian cricket by dismantling the heterosexual structure of the game.

The sixth chapter deals with the life transitions and lived experiences of the transgender community in the Bengali cinema. The chapter has raised the issues of ‘abled’ and ‘disabled’ bodies, “equating transgender identity with disabled identity’’ (p.104) and the forced institutionalization of transgender bodies into the normative perspectives of the body. Chapter seven has used the concept of spatial-temporality in the cinematic world of Rituparno Ghosh to construct the unstable nature of queerness which stands in opposition to the heterosexual domains of life. “Queerness as constantly being in a state of flux” (p.112). The spaces in these cinematic texts are treated as the metaphor of the “transgender body as being mutable and pliable” (p.114).

Chapter eight has examine the potential power of silence in the first Assamese queer film Fire Flies: Jonaki Porua (2019), as an empowering strategy to construct, visualize and manifest the lived realities and experiences of the queer community. The film also deals with the idea of home as a queer space of silence, exclusion, and homophobia by using the cinematic space to construct the fluidity of gender. The ninth chapter of the book has analyzed and conceptualized the varied kinds of agency of lesbian women in two films, Fire (1996) and Ek Ladki ko Dekha to Aisa Laga (2019). In the former, the protagonists deconstruct and disrupt the heteronormativity and choose freedom beyond it. In the latter, the protagonist resists heteronormativity, even while remaining within the patriarchal order of the society. The last and the tenth chapter of the book deals with the cinematic narratives of the queer in the neglected regions of India, Darjeeling and Sikkhism Hills. By using two short films and one queer-themed music video, the chapter raises issues of harassment of the queer in the workplace, and rural areas, and addresses lesbian and gay romance. By visualizing the narratives of queer in natural settings, the ‘unnatural’ idea of queer gets deconstructed.

The broad objective of this edited volume is to provide the readers with the multifaceted and pluralistic nature of sexuality through the lens of Indian cinema.  Films as tools of creative expression and each chapter of this book dwells on the construction of heteronormativity even as it disrupts and deconstructs it. By using the categories of ‘consent,’ ‘body,’ ‘space,’ voyeurism’ and ‘sports’ etc the contributors of this volume have tried to demonstrate the compulsory nature of heterosexuality which is essentially a site of power and domination. As a reader and researcher of sociology, the cinematic narratives of silence as the resistance to the hegemonic discourses and the queer ecological perspectives are refreshing and add new dimensions to academic research and scholarship. Media representation holds a paramount place in today`s world. Thus, this book is a valuable contribution to understanding the everyday experiences of sexuality and simultaneously, honouring and accepting the ‘otherness’ of the other i.e., the sexual minorities of the society.

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Ramsha Aveen is a PhD student at the Department of Sociology, Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI), New Delhi.