“The Shameless,” playing in the Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard section, brings into sharp relief the reality for women in India, told through the story of a woman who has been done no favors and does what she must to survive.
It’s no secret to those who watch the news that women in India have struggled against cultural forces that leaves women of lower economic means little recourse. “The Shameless” puts a face and a soul on that broad canvas of inequality.
But the protagonist Rena, played with devastating force by Anasya Sengupta, is no victim. From the opening scene, where we see her in a brothel cleaning and folding her knife, having just killed her client, a policeman, Rena is angry, desperate and hardened by life on the street.
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