Kiara Advani's 'War 2' Bikini Scene Sparks Controversy
Yesterday, a high-octane teaser of Ayan Mukerji's War 2 dropped online, and it's got everyone talking.
The action-packed sequel to War stars Hrithik Roshan, Jr. NTR, and Kiara Advani, and is slated for a theatrical release on 14th August.
Fans are particularly impressed by Jr. NTR's role, sharing how well suited he is against Hritik Roshan. Since its release, the teaser has garnered over 70 million views across platforms.
Another little detail in the teaser: Kiara Advani's introduction. She is seen wearing a bikini and walking by a swimming pool. Though the scene lasted just one second, it has got people (men) on the internet losing their damn minds.
#KiaraAdvani was trending on X (formerly known as Twitter) earlier today, with over 16,000 tweets under the hashtag.
But unlike Jr. NTR's action sequences and Hritik's general awesomeness, Kiara Advani is trending solely because of her bikini scene. Did I mention that the scene lasted ONE WHOLE SECOND?
The tweets, for one, are screenshots of Kiara Advani's bottom. The comments range from marvelling over how *it* would look on the big screen, to urging the Twitter audience to 'save' the screenshot, lest they 'regret it at midnight'. Multiple such screenshots and videos are doing the rounds.
So impactful was her ONE SECOND appearance, that director Ram Gopal Varma, in a now-deleted tweet, insinuated that the film would likely be successful if the two actors were fighting over her 'back' instead of over 'countries or societies'. His tweets were accompanied by screenshots of Kiara Advani in the bikini, with her back facing the camera.
Always keeping it respectful.
With the discourse around women's representation on screen, quality of female characters written for Indian films, and much more in full swing in the past few years, a trending hashtag focusing on a woman's body and that alone is disheartening, though unsurprising.
In 2023, actor Deepika Padukone received intense backlash for wearing a saffron-colored bikini in the song Besharam Rang, from the Shah Rukh Khan starrer, Pathaan. The song was also critiqued for its 'excessive skin show'.
Despite threats to boycott the film, Pathaan went on to earn a whopping 1,055 crore worldwide.
The duality of the Indian man is worth studying — criticizing women for wearing 'revealing' clothes while simultaneously contributing to their success by paying for it.
For a teaser that showed a female character for merely seconds, it is worth pondering over that this is still likely to be the reason people flock over to the theatre and watch the film.
Until then, let's wait for the trailer to truly understand where they all stand, shall we?
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