Sthal is a superb follow-up to Sairat, that explores women's agency in marriage and life
Illustration/Uday Mohite
GREAT NEWS: Sthal, A Match, in Marathi, directed by Jayant Digambar Somalkar, released on 155 screens in cinemas across Maharashtra last week. It is a compelling film on the terrible impact of successive arranged marriage match-making meetings on young women, worsened in the context of farmers’ distress. It is deeply rooted, deeply felt, and certainly merits discussions after the film. The film had a world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, TIFF, where it won the NETPAC Award for Best Asian Film in 2023. It is about a smart, young, college-going woman, Savita (Nandini Chikte), daughter of a cotton farmer in Dongargaon village, Vidarbha, Maharashtra, and the impact on her when patriarchal traditions force her to undergo a series of humiliating “kande pohe” arranged match meetings, that always end with her being rejected for her dark skin, height, etc.
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In fact, the film is an excellent counterpoint to Rohan Kanawade’s Sabar Bonda, Cactus Pears, also in Marathi, that won the Grand Jury Prize in the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Dramatic section in January. Sthal devastatingly observes how the misogynistic nature of arranged marriage meetings, compounded by the distress sale of farmer’s crops at low prices, is directly linked to the distress ‘sale’ of young women in marriage, at high dowry prices, because no one wants to have their daughter or son marry into a farmer’s family. On the other hand, Sabar Bonda suggests that with agricultural distress, as no girl wants to marry a farmer, it can open up--along with other reasons-- the possibility of homosexual relations, and goes on to exquisitely explore a rural gay relationship in a frank and tender manner that we have not seen before in an Indian feature. In other words, the lives of both women and men in Indian farm families are deeply impacted by the state of agriculture. Clearly, this is not a stray story, because The Economic Survey 2024-25 shows that India’s dependence on employment in agriculture--already in a vulnerable state--has, in fact, risen to 46.1% in 2023-24. Set in Vidarbha, which has among the highest rate of farmer suicides in India, Sthal is also in marked contrast to Smriti Mundhra’s Indian Matchmaking series on Netflix, set amid wealthy families in the US and India, where a sense of humour in the boy could be a deal-breaker.
Somalkar’s screenplay and direction are both strong, especially for a debut feature by the engineer-turned-filmmaker. He earlier directed a short, Iyatta: Class and Guilty Minds, an Amazon Original legal drama series, written and directed by Shefali Bhushan and himself (they are life partners too). While the subject of arranged marriages is not new, his tremendous empathy when telling the story from the girl’s viewpoint makes it a revelation. The opening scene, where the kande pohe tradition is subverted, is both delightful and hard-hitting. The screenplay is nuanced, where the woman’s successive grilling sessions—name, height, education, hobbies--her other girlfriends getting married, the low price of cotton, the betrayal of a seemingly liberal ummedwar (“candidate”), who later demands dowry, all take a toll on her. Her father is so harassed—leading to a heartbreaking scene in which he silently asks for forgiveness, unable to face his family or himself—that when they cancel Savita’s civil services exam attendance to meet one more ummedwar, he is unable to grasp that if Savita clears the exam and gets a job, she can save the whole family, including herself. There is a rough edge to the film that gives it immersive authenticity. With a powerful atta-majhi-satakli (I’ve had enough now) moment from Savita, she breaks the fourth wall, implicating all of us in the patriarchy.
There are references to caste via Dalit social reformers Savitribai Phule, the great women’s educationist, and Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar, who rose to be chief architect of India’s Constitution. Most of the cast, local non-actors, are good: Nandini Chikte is excellent as Savita, as is Taranath Khiratkar, playing her father Daulatrao Wandhare. Manoj Karmakar’s photography is effective, and Abhijit Deshpande’s editing is excellent. Madhav Agarwal and Tamara Kazziha’s music includes a wonderfully apt opening Marathi song. The producers are Shefali Bhushan, Karan Grover, Riga Malhotra and Jayant Somalkar. The women crew include producers Shefali Bhushan and Riga Malhotra, and singer Meerabai Yete. I only wish Indian women’s atta-majhi-satakli moment of defiance in real life would come years earlier. Sthal is a superb follow-up to Nagraj Manjule’s Sairat, which explores women’s agency in marriage and life, and is available on bookmyshow. Don’t miss this film.
Meenakshi Shedde is India and South Asia Delegate to the Berlin International Film Festival, National Award-winning critic, curator to festivals worldwide and journalist.
Reach her at meenakshi.shedde@mid-day.com
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