From heroes to villains: Muslim men in Bollywood

This article analyzes prominent Hindi films between 2008 and 2023 to explore Bollywood’s representations of Muslim masculinity from a global perspective. Specifically, this article compares films before and after 2014, the year when the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won India’s General Elections, to illuminate a crucial shift in Bollywood’s representations of Muslim masculinity. The article will demonstrate that Hindi films between 2008 and 2014 offered multi-textured portrayals of Muslim men on the big screen. In an era when Hollywood and North American television portrayals demonized Muslims, prominent Bollywood films not only celebrated Muslim masculinity but also highlighted the stigma faced by Muslim minorities in the West. Predominantly, Muslim characters in the pre-2014 period embodied a combination of hard and soft masculinity, demonstrating traits such as strength, dominance, and resilience, but also empathy and affection. Above all, these films showed Muslim men as relatively complex characters, capable of emotional growth and making positive contributions to society. However, the rapid growth of anti-Muslim rhetoric in India’s political discourse following 2014 can also be seen in South Asia’s leading film industry. In recent years, Bollywood has predominantly portrayed Muslim men as irredeemable characters. Prominent films depict Muslim men as irrational fanatics, barbaric militants, or deceitful lovers. This article demonstrates how Bollywood has started to reconfigure prominent Orientalist themes to denigrate Muslim masculinity for an international audience. In doing so, we explore the emerging relationship between Western and Indian Islamophobia.