[dexterljohnthefinanceguy]

This is digressive but I will yield to it because it seems potentially enjoyable.

Do those filmmakers intend to make a film that is, say, pro-casteist or anti-feminist? Are they consciously trying to make it that way? No, it's what we see in them.

I think this takes the beholder thing too far. Most of the times it is what it is. adhuvE illainreengaLA.

Take anti-feminism a popular trend - or even fetish - in our films.
Do they intend to make an anti-feminist scene. Sure as hell they do. They don't think it is something to be queasy about. We react because we see it through our prism, granted but that does not take away that the creator "wanted" to have his hero cut a woman down to size. It didn't happen incidentally. Nor does there seem to be alternative ways of reading it.

That's why I believe the mass of the mainstream watch-and-ignore films/book which are as deep (uh oh ! baed word) as pAlAr in summertime can be brushed aside for this discussion.

I'm saying one knows close to nothing about the personal sensibilities of these filmmakers (whether it is Bala or Mani Ratnam) even when one's trying to guess whether or not it's "appropriate" to make such a remark! That is all

Yes we never know for sure. Part of the reason why we devour information about the artist about and beyond his work. Most of the times the outcome is unpleasant. Yet, we (I ?) never learn.
All the time maintaining a schizophrenic adherence that I am not using the artist's 'life' to evaluate his art. Treating with scorn others' attempts to do when I am kind of doing precisely the same.

That we will never know for sure and is always in a position only to make reasonable, clever (?) guesses means we do harbour such a question.

KGB Officer: What do you think about Josef Stalin ?
Civilian: I think what you think Sir
KGB Officer: Then it is my duty to arrest you.

So, to actually make the remark is quite impolite and unfair. But can we banish the question from within us ? Should we just take the art and run and not bother disappointing ourselves ?

Or should adopt a 'real' worldview like a முற்போக்கு எழுத்தாளர்கள் சங்கம் pamphlet, which in a bid to say that artists don't exist in vacuum and must react to the society around them makes atrocious statements like: கலைஞர்களும் மனிதர்கள் தான். அவர்கள் ஒன்றும் வானத்திலிருந்து வந்து குதித்துவிடவில்லை.