Dangal’s Success in China: Embracing and Challenging Traditional Family Values

Eva Liu

Published in

The Ends of Globalization

7 min readMar 27, 2022

“Of course I love you.”

“Are you proud of me?”

…

That was an unfinished fight between me and my father three years ago. Since then, the word “pride” has never appeared in our conversations, yet it defined our relationship. I aimed to be an overachiever to earn my father’s approval, and he loved back selflessly, willing to do anything that would make me successful in the future. So we both lost it when the movie ended with: “You are my pride.” And certainly, we were not the only ones who were deeply moved.

Dangal, an Indian film released in 2016, is a story about a father named Mahavir who trains his daughters Geeta and Babita to be professional wrestlers and fulfill his dreams of earning a gold medal for India. While the movie was a hot hit in India, it was even more successful in China, earning 1.2 billion yuan (176 million dollars). It was the number one movie at the box office for 16 consecutive days and received an applaudingly high rating of 9.2 out of 10 on the Chinese media review site Douban. With no voiceovers and only subtitles, how did Dangal translate so well to the Chinese audience?

Bollywood star Aamir Khan’s popularity in China attracted moviegoers to turn their attention to Dangal, and the film grew popular as it played into Chinese people’s rising recognition for female empowerment and nationalistic pride, especially during the Xi era. Since Xi became president in 2012, women’s rights became increasingly suppressed in China. At the time of the release of the movie, China is in the 99th place for gender equality ranking, even lower than India, a country notoriously known for killing female babies and raping women. As the low ranking indicates, there was a strong and growing need for female empowerment in China. Yet, as the country transitioned from one-child to two-child policy, women’s place in society can be increasingly viewed as birth machines, especially in uneducated rural areas. For some, Dangal is a feminist movie, calling girls to break gender stereotypes and fight for equality. For others, Dangal was an inspirational athletic movie, for Chinese people had long treasured the accomplishments of Olympic gold medalists. However, I believe Dangal’s success in China mainly comes from emotional resonance by portraying traditional Chinese values of family relationships but at the same time highlighting a new possibility of raising strong daughters in a patriarchal society.

Dangal’s captivation of the Chinese audience largely comes from the Chinese family values it embraces, one of which is parental sacrifice. The Chinese saying “望子成龙，望女成凤”, which translates to “hopes for a son to grow into a dragon” and “hopes for a daughter to grow into a phoenix,” perfectly encaptures the mindsets of Chinese parents. Chinese parents’ devotion to their children’s success can be seen as rather exaggerated in Western cultures for they love too selflessly, willing to sacrifice anything for their children. The director Aamir believes that Dangal was a success in China because “it made people realize what their parents went through.” In the movie, the father wakes up at 5 am every morning, training alongside the girls. He sacrifices everything so that his daughters have a brighter future, enduring the judgmental words of the villagers. And when his eldest daughter Geeta leaves him for the new coach, he could not hide his disappointment but nevertheless takes it as a price for her success. His lonely and hunched back from the national sports academy to home, his blank eyes losing light after Geeta defeating him in the mud, and his held-back tears when Geeta cries on the phone vividly describe an aged father, exhausted and heartbroken. Yet when she loses her international match, he is there for her, no matter how deeply he was hurt.

What makes Dangal extraordinary is its choice to narrate how the daughters receive their father’s heavy love, starting from initial incomprehensiveness. It is a common phenomenon that Chinese children often resent their parents for being too strict and demanding in their childhood, viewing their parents’ sacrificial love as a burden. Many Chinese parents often say “Do you know how much I have sacrificed for you?” And kids detested that suffocating question. For countless times in my childhood, I was fearful that my failure means that they gave up their careers in futility and felt their love as a heavyweight on my shoulders. Mirroring many Chinese children, Geeta and Babita do not comprehend their father’s sacrificial love at first. Geeta bitterly complains that her father “makes them run at 5 am, work like a slave, and wrestle with boys. If they protest, their hair will be cut off.” She even ignorantly comments that she hopes no one will have a father like hers. Secretly, I was once like Geeta, jealous of other fathers that were more caring and gentle to their children. But I was told that I will understand my dad’s love when I am grown. Admittedly, it took me more than 18 years to reconcile with my father’s unspoken pride in me, with his harsh words, with his high expectations, and with his sacrificial type of love. It was not until I saw his growing white hair; it was not until I saw his tears when he waved goodbye at the airport; it was not until I saw his reconciliation with his father, who was too strict, too harsh, and too loving. As one of the most popular songs in China in 2012, Father’s remorseful lyrics captured a typical Chinese child’s late understanding of fatherly love — “I did not understand how difficult it was for you until I grow up.” Chinese children have a hard time empathizing with their parents because sacrificial love often causes discontent and rebellion for children who long for less duty and expectations. In Chinese culture, children do not truly understand their parents’ love until they have matured or become parents themselves, and Dangal perfectly describes this delicate journey of the coming-of-age and realization of fatherly love. In a conversation with a young bride at an arranged marriage, she reminds Geeta and Babita how fortunate they are for having a father that thinks for them. She compares her desperate fate with the girls’ bright future: “Otherwise you will be like me, stuck with chores the rest of your life, marry at 14 to lessen the burden of the family, and be sent to a man you have never met before. The rest of your life will be taking care of him and his children.” Geeta and Babita finally come to understand their father’s selfless sacrifice as the bride points out, “[your father] fights against the world for you and bears people’s mockery for you. Why? Because he wants you to take control of your future.” While this dialogue was a complete wake-up to Babita, Geeta’s appreciation of her father came much later when she called home from the sports academy and apologized for hurting her father’s feelings.

After comprehending the type of sacrificial love parents offer, Chinese children follow filial piety of their own will, instead of obeying their parents out of fear. A central tenet of Confucianism, filial piety means the respect and love children hold for their parents, also referred to as “孝.” Acts of filial piety include obeying parents’ wishes and working hard to provide for their comforts. In the same way, Geeta and Babita transition from being forced to train and listen to their father out of fear to willingly listening to his advice with respect and appreciation. This change of mindset is most obvious with Geeta’s growth. After she advanced in a major international wrestling competition, she told the press that her success “is all thanks to [her] dad. He always believes that [she] can do it.” At the Commonwealth Games, Geeta, for all three rounds, ignores the coach’s opinion and listens to her father’s coaching advice instead. This choice is in sharp contrast when she first arrives at the sports academy and gets tired of her father’s old-school wrestling tactics. Without her realization of her father’s sacrifice, Geeta is performing filial piety out of duty and fear, not out of respect and love.

From parental sacrifice and the children’s eventual understanding and return of filial piety, Chinese traditional family values are beautifully embraced in Dangal, leading to its success; however, I think it is more important to recognize the lesson Dangal has brought to China: redefining the role of fatherhood and girls in a patriarchal society. In China, many female babies are killed or abandoned since birth, especially in rural areas where only sons are considered valuable. Dangal describes this tragic phenomenon, as every villager becomes an expert at giving birth to a boy. They test out all kinds of strange methods, including mystery chants, only having sex on Sundays, and feeding cows sesame-made sugar before sunrise. However, despite Mahavir’s initial disappointment in having only daughters, he realizes that girls too can fulfill his dream of winning a gold medal for India. When the mother is concerned about the girls’ marriage and traditional roles of women taking care of the household, Mahavir responds with an implicitly feminist message: “I will make the girls strong. Men will not choose them; they will choose men.” Before Geeta enters her final match at the Commonwealth Games, Mahavir reminds her that “the gold medal not only belongs to you, but to thousands of girls, who were valued less than boys, limited to housework, and destined to spend their life nurturing a family. Your opponent is not only the Australian but all the others who look down on girls.” With this quote, Dangal does more than strike an emotional chord with the Chinese audience as Mahavir redefines the future of his daughters to be professional wrestlers and thereby breaks gender walls. While some critics argue that the movie does not empower girls because they are manipulated by their fathers, most would agree that Dangal has caused the Chinese audience to rethink the role of women in a patriarchal society. Indeed, the film has earned support from Chinese feminist organizations, which handed out free movie tickets. It is truly remarkable how a film produced in a country with women’s rights problems can bring female empowerment to another country that shares the same gender stereotypes. The globalization of culture causes reflection and attempts to affect change not just to the home country but also to other countries who feel the emotional echo.

Sources:

Dangal’s Success in China: Embracing and Challenging Traditional Family Values

Written by Eva Liu