Stereotypical and caricaturish Bollywood characters are notorious for being used as punching bags for comic relief. The Tamilians of South India have also been victims of trope-treatment, which has reduced their identity to English-speaking, veg-eating and Rajinikant-loving Brahmins.
The teaser for Karan Johar’s ‘Meenakshi Sundareshwar’ has recently been out and it sparked the same discussion online due to the ‘gross stereotyping.’ The Netflix film starring Sanya Malhotra and Abhimanyu Dassani is ostensibly about a long-distance relationship in which the couple finds love in an arranged marriage, but it’s all tainted when the characters portray often repeated cliched situations that we saw a thousand times, including the Thalaiva connection.
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Tamilians, understandably, are fed up with Bollywood’s attempts to cage them into the same stale categories and have gone to social media to point out the various flaws in the trailer. Take a look:
As if Chennai Express didn’t do enough damage: what the actual fuck is this? https://t.co/vnM25J1KfU
— Krishna.K (He/They) (@kriiiiishhhhhhh) October 12, 2021
Typical Shitty Stereotyping of Tamil nadu by Bollywood .
& No offence , Why always RAJINIKANTH reference ??
Its exhausting to see the stereotypical portrayal of TAMIL people in Bollywood movies .#Valimai #AjithKumar https://t.co/KJntVUxIRD— Varun Ak (@nameless233332) October 12, 2021
Enough of repeating same stereotypes ra. South isn't just Idly Sambar and Rajnikanth movies! ? https://t.co/joufePUgjT
— Kiran (@inquisitivekidd) October 12, 2021
https://twitter.com/Pazuzugallu666/status/1447881012130684936?s=20
At this point I'm convinced they do this shit simply to piss us off ???? https://t.co/LhkAOKFUv3
— vaathu is kolar cooker ? (@kulambssss) October 12, 2021
Playing a kuthu song in the background doesn't make the trailer appear even remotely tamilian.
also what up with this talkin' bout rajnikanth with no context?Happy Stereotyping ?#MeenakshiSundareshwar pic.twitter.com/o5jhXtZQxi
— dihurdeys (@Ruhid_Syed) October 12, 2021
Dei @NetflixIndia kenji kaekurom, please just leave us alone#MeenakshiSundareshwar pic.twitter.com/Cj8tR4PNfY
— Bhavya Venkatesh (@bhavyavenkatesh) October 12, 2021
Amongst all things that gets misinterpreted in Bollywood movies, Tamil representations got to be right up there. #MeenakshiSundareshwar
— Koushik Kannan (@KoushikKannan3) October 12, 2021
Less than 10 seconds into the video and I already know they did not do any research. #MeenakshiSundareshwar pic.twitter.com/u1foQYVRLP
— bharathi (@VenkatBharathy) October 12, 2021
Stereotyping at its best (worst)! Another bollywood film to stereotype south indians as vegetarian, folk song listening, Rajinikanth loving, pretentious English speaking people. Grow up guys!#MeenakshiSundareshwar
— Vignesh Venugopal (@vvignettist) October 12, 2021
I dont know when will bollywood understand that all Tamil's are not brahmins. All Tamil's are not veg eaters. Even brahmins wont dress and talk like this now a days. And not all tamil songs are folk songs. And stop ur obsession with our superstar!#MeenakshiSundareshwar https://t.co/oSMamGPhO1
— MS (@dragondeenas) October 12, 2021
https://twitter.com/mrmaskmf/status/1447815849398571010?s=20
Bollywood people showing south is basically like Hollywood people showing India or Indian films..
No one has any clue, except for the generic things they think that represent the culture..#MeenakshiSundareshwar #HowJadedIsThis https://t.co/sJW8umPgcP— Srujana Uppuluri (@srujau) October 12, 2021
Couldn’t cast actual Tamil actors, still thinks Rajnikanth is the only star that Tamil people love, an engineer joke and a general air of cringe around the whole thing??????
How about stick to producing stuff that you know, eh @NetflixIndia @Dharmatic_ ?? https://t.co/0SxGvbI590
— James Ashwin (@JAshR07) October 12, 2021
Insert Tamil songs, Tamil icons and Tamil culture (grossly stereotyped) to get some eyeballs, but the characters only speak in Hindi!! Chennai is just 2 hours away by flight from Bombay, one visit would have made the makers realise what an atrocity this is #MeenakshiSundareshwar https://t.co/yl4qiyG9cA
— Akshita Nandagopal (@Akshita_N) October 13, 2021
Now, one can only hope that the film does better when the trailer is released, paving the way for the release of the picture. Meanwhile, Meenakshi Sundareshwar will be Abhimanyu Dassani’s digital debut, as well as the directorial debut of Vivek Soni. The film was produced by Karan Johar’s Dharma Entertainment and is slated to premiere on Netflix on November 5.
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