The Kerala Story (2023)

Directed by

Sudipto Sen

Genre

crime, drama

Country

India

Runtime

2h 18m

Rated

A

Rating

4.5 of 10 from 33 voters

Elsewhere

IMDb

How it feels

A group of women from Kerala are coerced into converting to Islam and joining the Islamic State. The film is a fictionalized account that claims to be based on true events. It was met with overwhelmingly negative reviews from critics.

controversialintenseaccusatorydivisivemelodramaticserious

What happens

The Kerala Story is a 2023 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Sudipto Sen and produced by Vipul Amrutlal Shah. It stars Adah Sharma, Siddhi Idnani, Yogita Bihani and Sonia Balani. The plot follows a group of women from Kerala who are coerced into converting to Islam and joining the Islamic State. Marketed as a true story, the film is premised on the Hindutva theory of "love jihad", and claims that thousands of Hindu women from Kerala have been converted to Islam and recruited in the Islamic State. However, the filmmakers had to accept the addition of two disclaimers – that the figures in the film were inauthentic, and that the film was a "fictionalised" depiction of events. The Kerala Story released in theatres on 5 May 2023. With a worldwide gross of ₹303.97 crore (US$32 million), it became the ninth-highest-grossing Hindi film of 2023. It was heavily promoted by the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which leveraged the film in its campaigning for the 2023 Karnataka assembly election. The film was met with overwhelmingly negative reviews and panned by critics. It received heavy criticism for its illogical screenplay, cast performances, the inaccurate depiction of Kerala State, and was characterised as a propaganda film. The film has also faced protracted litigation and protests, primarily in Kerala, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. At the 71st National Film Awards, The Kerala Story won 2 awards: Best Direction (Sen) and Best Cinematography. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

Trailer

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