Veteran screenwriter Javed Akhtar has always been vocal about different issues in his interviews. Recently, he talked about how cinema has evolved over time. Akhtar said that in the past, men were called 'angry young men,' while women either lacked such titles or were not portrayed with similar anger on screen.
In an interview with 'We Are Yuvaa,' he was questioned about Hema Malini's portrayal in 'Sholay,' where she appeared as a bubbly character but couldn't come across as an angry young woman.
The question posed was: 'If an angry young man can exist, why can't an angry young woman emerge in cinema?' To which he responded, "Society mein puri tarah nahi aayi, society hi clear nahi thi, society abhi bhi clear nahi hai, because the one who is conservative says 'Agar main modern aurat ko define karunga toh I will lose a lot of territory'. Jo liberal hai voh darte hai ki maine define kiya toh somebody will out liberal me. Aacha toh bas itna hi tum khatey ho, so ye sab vague hai but image will come out."
He went on to say how women are portrayed in cinema in today's time, setting an example of films his own daughter Zoya Akhtar has made with her production Tiger Baby. He said, "In Zoya's film, we can see today's women. In her first film Luck By Chance, you will see women's characters, in Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara can see Katrina Kaif's characters or in the film Dil Dhadakne Do Priyanka Chopra or Anushka Sharma, they are modern women so it's happening in films now."
On the work front, Javed's last movie as a lyricist was Kho Gaye Hum Kahan. The film starred Siddhant Chaturvedi, Ananya Panday, and Adarsh Gourav. It was directed by Arjun Varain Singh, and produced by Excel Entertainment and Tiger Baby Films.
