Watching the trailer of Dirty Picture is a nightmare. And the reviews that speak volumes of Vidya Balan's beautiful portrayal as the sensuous diva irritate me. S..i...l...k...the very name that evokes passion, sexuality and arousal in men all over the nation! A skinny Vidya is no match to the voluptuous dusky beauty who had a generation gripped in sexual fervor. And the sensual 'aura' that emanates from Silk's eyes and pouted lips...my..my...Vidya is a meek kitten, compared to the cougar! Sorry Vidya, you fail miserably...In that case, no woman can possibly touch the heights Silk's sexuality did!
During the peak "silk" era of 1980s, i was a mere baby. Still i can remember being told- 'an apple that Silk Smitha bit was auctioned for Rs.500 in a movie shoot'. Such was the charisma and charm she enthused in an otherwise mundane and glum South Indian movie industry. I remember i was told to close my eyes..ahem...while watching the "pon meni uruguthe" song from Moondram pirai, in the theatre! I was about six or seven then! Silk knew how to gyrate and sway, though she never was a great dancer. Husky and sensual singing of Janaki helped her carve a niche in Tamil movie industry. She knew how to twirl the men of the movie industry over her little fingers! There were men who waited at her doorstep, for her to simply wag her finger at them. Vijayalakshmi, fourth standard drop out from a dusty village near Eluru, AP, could have never scaled these heights, if not for men...
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| Picture courtesy tamilwire.com |
Being raped at 9 years, married to a waste to fend off molesters, Silk always nursed a secret dream of making it big in Kollywood. What not the way out than running away to Chennai? She started her reel life as a touch up girl to a B grader. Luckily, she played the 'man- snatcher', manipulating the paramour ( i wouldn't name him here:P) to land in a plump role in a Malayalam movie. Her first movie in Tamil "vandi chakkaram" ( 1979) earned her a huge name in movie industry. It gave her the name "Silk" too! She was one woman who knew her game and how to use her cards...It was after "moondram pirai" that earned her a cult status did she end up being typecast as "the other woman", a vamp all the time, dressed in skimpy bikinis and murdered in the climax scenes! Most movies that just had her performing a single 'item number' with mundane story lines became superhits. She was the MOTHER of all ITEM GIRLS!
She was the peer to our Rakhi Sawants ( now there, i had my dig at her this time too:P) and probably Angelina Jolie learnt her pout from Silk Mamma! At the pinnacle of success, Silk charged Rs 50,000 for an item song. Imagine this was in mid 1980s when heroes down South were toiling for 20 or 30000 bucks a movie! There is no drug muckier than success and it was success that climbed to her head and brought her movie empire come tumbling like a pack of cards. Her subsequent fall from the top aided by fresh heroines who were ready to shed even bikinis at the drop of the hat and drug abuse is a rather sad story. Her probable suicide abetted by a love story gone wrong, lists her with the other young starlets who had unnatural deaths- Divyabarathi, Shoba, Savitri...
Though dead and gone, her sultry eyes, pesky pout and voluptuous frame shall always remain etched in the memories of a generation. All she has is my genuine sympathy and understanding. Which makes me ask the critical question- Is Silk Smitha an icon of women's sexuality misinterpreted and exploited by Kollywood's dark caverns or a vamp who 'used' the men who came her way? Further more, are women in Kollywood 'used' and 'exploited' mercilessly by its men, as we go by general understanding?
