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Where
is WOMAN in Indian advertising? Is the way she is being portrayed
a fair (figuratively and otherwise) reflection of the changing times,
or is it that advertising prefers to stride back in step, sticking
with the safe and formulaic? When it comes to women, is Indian advertising
investing its creatives juices in the debt market instead of the
more dynamic equity field?
This
is what Euro RSCG India has attempted to answer in its recent study
Eve-olution.
The conclusions that Eve-olution has derived and the premise
it was based upon to begin with, can broadly be laid out thus:
*
The woman of today is more ambitious and independent than her sisters
of a decade ago. With a higher disposable income and an over-riding
ambition, women have moved away from just marriage and motherhood
as their primary goals.
*
In the last decade, Bollywood has portrayed women who have a certain
degree of self-absorption accompanied with hedonism and self expression.
Looking at the marketing possibilities that emerge from the NEW
WOMAN, one sees a consumer with not only the potential to spend
on herself but also LIKES to spend on herself.
* Cinema
has seen a new sensibility in female characterisation that have
added to the old roles. If this can be accepted by mass cinema then
why must advertising stick to the conventional?
* The
appearance of more well-rounded female characters in mainstream
cinema that connect with their off-screen counterparts is indicative
of a new trend that needs to be studied more carefully by advertisers
and advertising professionals.
Why
the discerning woman?
The
discerning women today, form a significant quotient of the consuming
mass. Having said that, Eve-olution essentially aimed at
understanding and looking at women prosumers (proactive consumer)
who are integral to what one calls brand awareness and reach.
Addressing
the prosumer is a strategy that Euro RSCG firmly believes in. These
are primarily men and women who have taken the best advantage of
current technologies and social conditions to become more proactive,
more powerful, and more influential in their consumer relationships.
Moving onto specifics, Eve-olution looks at the changing
portrayal of the Indian woman in Indian commercial cinema over the
last decade, which is beginning to see its female protagonist as
a woman who tells a story and not just someone playing out male
fantasies as is the norm in clichéd conventional roles. The
agency derives that this reflection, like any other mass media,
is responsive to society's dynamics. The prime motive of this study
being - to derive lessons for the advertising and marketing fraternity.
Euro
RSCG's case in point is that the last decade has seen a more feminine
perspective on the rise.
 The
Triple F-er (fabulous, 40+ and female) - The
reel-reflection being Rekha in Khiladiyon Ka Khiladi and
Dimple Kapadia in Dil Chahta Hai. This cinematic mileu has
seen the older actors not as mama's to the new heroes but as their
sweethearts.
 The
Bold Digger, who is a young wannabe, who believes in materialism
and is unapologetic about it. Instances
given are Juhi Chawla (Yes Boss), Sushmita Sen (Biwi No
1), Sridevi (Judaai), Bipasha Basu (Jism), all
of whom find money to be the only reason for loving, leaving, or
just plain existing.
Desi
Diva - a passionate, wilful young woman who is ruled by her
heart and has scant regard for norms imposed by society. This is
attributed to the changing scenario of how a woman conducts her
romantic life and the moral leeway allowed to a woman due to her
independence, financial position and societal stature.
The
common strand between Karisma Kapoor (Zubeida), Tabu (Astitva),
Urmilla Matondkar (Pyar Tune Kya Kiya) and Kajol (Gupt)
is that they all abandon convention to embrace passion. They are
characters that even a few years ago, no mainstream actress would
have fleshed out, or so Eve-olution contends.
 The
Hotshot Careerist is the most visible modern cliché.
Generally single or divorced. If married, it is to a workaholic,
and she feels that motherhood can wait. This is said to have come
from the woman's career becoming the epicentre of modern living.
Juhi Chawla as a TV reporter (Phir Bhi Dil Hain Hindustani),
Lisa Ray as lawyer (Kasoor), Sushmita Sen as cop (Samay),
Preity Zinta as an investigator (Sangharsh) are all cases
in point.
 The
Equal Half is the young wife of today. With a career in place,
she is her own person but not overtly independent. With aspects
like nuclear family, work pressures and urban demands putting the
husband-wife equation on a more equal footing. Even when the wife
does not have a career, she is still not relegated to being a non
entity in the marriage. Rani Mukherjee in Saathiya, Juhi
Chawla in Teen Deewarien, Aishwarya Rai in Hum Dil De
Chuke Sanam and Shilpa Shetty in Dhadkan question the
very institution of marriage, and the rights of a husband, and the
demands made of a wife.
Gal
Pal; friendship is a support system without which they cannot
traverse road bumps like parental/marital pressures, office politics,
dietary disappointment or just plain old life.
 Cinema
usually portrayed girlfriends on screen restricted to sacrificing
their mutual object of love, singing songs or exchanging giggly
confidences all centered around the hero. But Filhaal saw
a Sushmita Sen loaning her womb to Tabu. In Lajja, Manisha
Koirala bonds with Mahima Choudhary, Madhuri Dixit and Rekha at
a very deep level and in Mrityudand Madhuri has Shabana Azmi
and Shilpa Shirodkar as shock absorbers. These movies captured the
chemistry and compassion of female friendship and gave a fresh dimension
to an old cliché.
Coming
to the urban jungle, the Warrior Princess is a woman who
fights her own battles and keeps her own scores. She is not a man
hater/baiter but a woman who forms successful and equal alliances
with the opposite sex.
 On
screen revenge and hate are emotions that were previously allowed
only to the male species. But Karisma Kapoor in Shakti and
Fiza, Manisha with her gals in Lajja and then in Dil
Se, Raveena Tandon in Daman, and Kajol in Dushman,
saw the cropping of women who took care of this oversight.
The
Bindaas Babe is vivacious. Success  has
become an ingredient to judge women. And while grooming
may be in fifth gear on the Indian screen with female actors going
for silicon pouts and lipo-sucked waists, the irony is that average
looking women have also made it. A chubby tomboyish Kajol is seen
in Kuch Kuch Hota Hain and Lagaan adorns a simple
looking Gracie Singh. Antara Mali in Mein Madhuri Dixit Banna
Chati Hoon does not have the physical charms of the female superstar
she is emulating. Sonali Kulkarni and Suchitra Pillai in Dil
Chahta Hai are not the fair and lovelies that Bollywood has
a proclivity for.
 The
last category Neo Maaji is 50 plus, has grown up children
and a busy or retired husband, or she is widowed or divorced. Her
distinguishing feature is her existence apart from home and family.
Widowed
mothers like Rekha in Dil Hai Tumhara and wife, mother, and
grandmother Hema Malini in Baghban are affectionate mamas
but with a life of their own.
These
Hindi film new age "wonder women" form the basis of the
thesis that Eve-olution is propounding.
When
the premise of Eve-olution was presented to film critics
by indiantelevision.com, they, however, didn't seem
so convinced.
Commenting
on the same, film critic and writer Deepa Gehlot points out: "I
don't agree that Indian mainline cinema has seen any changes in
terms of the portrayal of the urban woman. While the plot may seem
to have taken a step forward, the sub text has actually taken a
backward leap. The change is very marginal and most so-called women-centric
movies seem to be exhibiting a very false sense of feminism. Hence,
I would think that the change one sees is very superficial."
Gehlot
adds that though there might be a film or two released every year
that delves into issues like lesbianism or infidelity, this is mainly
done to sensatianalise rather than emphathise. So, although there
might be introduction of newer roles, the contextual reference of
woman per se has remained status quo. But yes, there has been definite
improvement in commercial cinema when one compares it to television
or the advertising space.
India
Today deputy editor Kaveri Bamzai on the other hand sees merit
in the Eve-olution thesis, "Yes, the last decade has
definitely seem some serious changes in the portrayal of women in
commercial cinema. This is because the new generation women are
the children of the 80's - the post liberalisation phase. Also,
the emergence of multiplexes have opened avenues for filmmakers
to try their hand at different themes. Earlier, a movie like Phir
Milenge could not have been made, simply because no one would
run it. But today there is an increasing need for different products
in the movie arena and therefore the cropping up of diverse movies
that also command a decent audience."
Bamzai
also states that television on the other hand has regressed over
the last few years. Although a product like Jassi Jaissi Koi
Nahin took off very well in a "saas-bahu" dominated
world, a year after its inception, the Spanish novella's ratings
have been steadily dipping (incidentally it is treading more on
the love track now). Bamzai sees a link between the lack of "progress"
on television to the "rut" that advertising remains in.
According
to Bamzai, advertising cannot exist in isolation. Most households
in India are single TV ones, so expecting advertisers to dish out
ads not "in-character" with the programmes that are being
watched is expecting too much.
TV
being a family driven exercise, advertisers need to cater to the
TV viewing audience, who currently, as ratings state, devour a family
centric saga revolving around the typical Indian household. Hence,
the logical progression for advertising which weaves itself around
television is to follow the TV norm, is Bamzai's argument.
Interestingly,
UTV COO Vikas Verma voices, "The traditional woman wearing
her sindoor and serving her husband tea in the morning is not reality.
The gender bias towards the traditional role of a woman doesn't
exist anymore. I think advertisers today have got it very, very
wrong. There are two ways they look at women. One is a very traditional
saas-bahu situation and the second is as a sex object. Both are
totally unacceptable. If you want to do a beer ad targeted at men,
show a naked woman. But, if you want to target a woman, either you
show a naked man or you show a woman in her natural environment;
and her environment today is not the kitchen, not the bathroom.
So, whenever an ad shows a women being proud of her great culinary
skills or identifying the right detergent, her happiness is shown
to come from a validation from another (male). Today's woman needs
no validation."
Verma,
a former advertising professional, lately turned TV head honcho,
is very vociferous about advertising for women being on the wrong
path.
Tabloid
Mid-Day's film critic and feature writer Mayank Shekhar opines,
"Most films today have a female protagonist mainly to titillate
the male viewer with the emergence of 'item numbers'. Yes, compared
to TV, cinema may have seen a slight drift ahead, but having said
that given the current scenario in Bollywood, films are still very
male dominated and I see no real change in the way women have been
portrayed."
All
said and done, women today are better educated, earning more money
than ever and make the bulk of buying decisions. Yet when it comes
to wooing women, advertisers could use a lesson in the art of courtship.
Ads that are aimed at women too often leave them feeling objectified,
debased or demoralised -- the beer-babe-and-bimbo, male-targeted
ads are seriously offensive to women. Other ads that are targeted
at women fail to recognise the evolution the urban women has gone
through.
Coming
back to the basis of Euro RSCG's hypothesis, which is that the bold
and the beautiful of the celluloid world have important lessons
to offer advertisers. And while the verdict
may still be out on the inferences Eve-olution has drawn
about the "progress" Hind cinema has made in the last
decade, there is no gainsaying that advertising needs to get a little
cutting edge when it directs communication at a certain female segment.
Purchase is about power and ads today, targeting women often fail
to empower her.
Are
women buying the message that advertisers have to sell? This is
a question that needs some serious contemplation. After all, enough
data reiterates the fact that the consumer is queen. More accurately
the prosumer queen.
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