Karthik Subbaraj's Dorothy is a landmark film that gifts the trans woman a happily ever after

The Fault in Our Films: The Tamil film finds, within the circle of toxic and violent men, a tender pool of empathy and solidarity for a woman to come out.

The title of Karthik Subbaraj’s volcanic and extraordinary drama Dorothy means ‘gift of God’ in Greek. In the Tamil film, Dorothy is the name of a new woman in the house, one who arrives midway, essayed by Keerthy Suresh. This house, as the film establishes up until this point in telling signs, has no space for a woman. As Sananth's Subbu laments, this is a place where neither her mother nor her sister survived under the aggressive male dominance. So when Dorothy arrives, angelic and soft in her femininity, she shakes up the fulcrum of the space. She becomes the missing spark that lights up the house. She is the gift, mostly for Subbu, who musters up the courage to face her truth. (Spoilers ahead)

Subbu transitions to become Dorothy

Dorothy stars Rishikanth and Sananth in lead roles.

For Subbu has been hiding- from her family, her best friend Karthi (Rishikanth), and the entire parochial Sevapatti village in Tamil Nadu, that she is a woman from inside. Dorothy sees her as a woman at last, but at what cost. Subbaraj establishes her coming out with the intensity of a horror film, as Subbu shaves her facial hair, discards the shirt and wears a saree and opens the door to announce that she is a lady, not a ladyboy.

Karthik Subbaraj's Dorothy stars Keerthy Suresh, Sananth and Rishikanth in lead roles.

Dorothy is a film about identity and its repression, as Subbaraj suggests how the rigid lines of caste pride and patriarchy are drawn in order for toxic masculinity to thrive. At the beginning of Dorothy, Subbaraj places Karthi and Subbu as two innocent children, who will grow up to become the toxic and ruthless men they are surrounded by. But one's internal sense of self and gender identity cannot be prescribed by their environment. The manner in which young Subbu fights, he would have become the macho gangster everyone in his family wanted. But Subbu is not that man. Subbu hides and hides until she cannot hide any longer. She wants Karthi to see it too, and Rishikanth exquisitely brings out that dichotomy of seeing Subbu disappear in front of his own eyes. Subbaraj grants him an extended sequence at the end, as he faces the questions about his inner turmoil and realises, how, he must not see Subbu in the new woman and accept her new identity. Subbu is dead, this is not his friend. Subbu is gone, she is Dorothy.

The journey of Dorothy

Dorothy is a film where trans women exist and claim their right to live with dignity. But what really struck me as extraordinary in Subbaraj's daring is how he manages to grant the trans woman a happy ending. The last sequence, of Subbu embracing her womanhood in a complete transformation is strikingly depicted, elevated by Ilaiyaraaja's divine score. Karthi sees her and is transfixed. She is no longer a friend he knew, she is a woman now. They seal their new relationship with a kiss, and the film concludes on that extraordinary image. It ends in this hope that the trans woman has now found her right to live and love with complete freedom.

I cannot remember the last time a film ended with a trans woman happy. In Haddi, the trans woman is consumed by her quest for revenge to gather any sense of semblance. In Super Deluxe, the trans woman has to go through a series of humiliations to finally reconcile with her young son. In Love Sex Aur Dhokha 2, the trans woman is forced into taking desperate, painful choices to save her ground. Then, in Paava Kadhaigal, the trans woman in Thangam is relentlessly harassed and attacked to meet her own end. And most devastatingly in Nagarkirtan, it is the trans woman who chooses to die rather than face more humiliation despite having a man by her side.

Dorothy rises up to this often tragic conclusion to trans lives in cinema and asks, why can't a trans woman be seen without the tragedy, without the fear and constant pain attached to her body? Why can't we imagine her happy? Subbaraj's film is a watershed moment for Indian cinema, a truly landmark film in its own right. Dorothy wants to instill hope amongst fear, acceptance over shame, because there is nothing more revolutionary than love.

Dorothy is available to watch on Netflix.

This is The Fault in Our Films, where Santanu Das writes about one acclaimed film/series and what stops the ‘good’ from becoming ‘great’.