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Secrets unite four women in rural India: a burka-clad college student dreams of becoming a pop singer; a young beautician seeks to escape from her small town through a torrid love affair; a mother of three finds personal accomplishment as a saleswoman without her husband’s knowledge; and a 55-year-old widow rediscovers her sexual desire through a phone romance. Caught in a conservative society, together these women will bend, or outright break, society’s rigid codes. This is Alankrita Shrivastava’s second feature, a celebration of women’s struggle for independence in India… and the entire world. Winner of The Spirit of Asia award at the 2016 Tokyo International Film Festival, Lipstick Under My Burkha breaks free from Bollywood’s strict moral codes and is an unconventional and crowd pleasing comedy that has been called “A euphoric tale of veiled desire.” —The Hollywood Reporter
Press
"Four daring Indian women from 18 to 55 assert their personal and sexual rights in Alankrita Shrivastava’s feminist dramedy" - Hollywood Reporter
"The result is an energetic, passionate film” - Eye For Film
Director’s Statement
I have never worn the burkha. I don’t live in a small town. No one has tried to curb my freedom.
I come from a fairly liberal middle-class family and I live in a metropolitan city. Yet there is always something gnawing away within me. Some chains that seem to hold me back. I never feel totally free.
Perhaps I am no different from that small town woman who is dreaming of freedom. Perhaps her secret acts of rebellion are mine too. And chains are chains, be they external or internal.
This oneness with the characters is what fascinates me. I feel each one of the characters is part of me. This film is then perhaps my own search for freedom.
The landscape of small town India is rapidly changing. So are the desires and aspirations of women.
Through the colorful kaleidoscope of their world, we see these women secretly trying to live a little of their small lipstick dreams.
Dodging prying eyes, battling fear, they go about their days… reading what they shouldn’t be, singing what they shouldn’t be, feeling what they shouldn’t be and wanting what they shouldn’t be wanting.
From a Western perspective, perhaps their desires may seem small. But it is the smallness of their desires that makes the story poignant for me.
I hope by making this film I have been able to break some new ground in exploring the complex interior world of a woman in India.
Through the four stories, I have tried to dig deep into what it means to be a woman. What it means to desire, and have the courage to act upon that desire.
This story of four ordinary women in small town India, dreaming small lipstick dreams of freedom is then an important, universal story
Director’s Biography
Alankrita Shrivastava is a feature film director and screenwriter from Mumbai, India with a penchant for telling women’s stories. She likes to explore the complex interior world of women through her films.
Alankrita has written and directed two features films - Turning 30 (2011) and Lipstick Under My Burkha,
She has worked on several Indian feature films including Raajneeti as an Associate Director, and Khoya Khoya Chand as an Executive Producer.
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