The early 90's were also the era of the Rural hero, a macho farmer, land owner who championed the cause of those who worked for him.Ravichandran is a particularly Popular hero of these times.With a trailing panche & curved moustache, divine music from Hamsalekha, he stole hearts 
This was infact such an important image for Ravichandran, that even he played a city boy, he turns to the village tests his mettle as a farmer, and succeeds to validate his position as hero in some films. This, along with Ambareesh's films marks the strong Mandya identity.
We move back to Bangalore now, There were several films that relied exclusively on Violent rowdy story + tender love story + greek tragedy twist, and the format evolved as time went on. Note how films are named after areas of the city to suggest them as battlegrounds in the story
If it isn't obvious already, in this flood of testosterone and tomato ketchup, the women characters became largely props in the movies, whether the creators were aware of this transformation or not, is anyone's guess. I think we alienated the family audiences at this time.
Despite some lovely films made in the time that were intimate, sensitive, devoid of the same urban angst that the Rowdy films had; people still think of the era as that of violent cinema. I disagree, in fact, these films were a sign of things to come.
Continuing with the Rowdy themes, Mr. Raghavendra points out that these films depict the growing angst of the Kannada identity in Bangalore. Not just of any Kannadiga, the Non-Bangalorean migrant Kannadiga. By the 90's with the IT boom came the boom of the Services industry.
New restaurants, New cars, New malls, all of which needed human resources, supplied in near endless quantity partly by people outside Karnataka, but mostly by smaller moffussil towns. The already strained Kannadiga identity shows its cracks in the movies.
As it happens with migrant populations, more young men move in as compared to women, and the films show just that. The woman characters are Mothers, Sisters, PYT Girlfriend who shrieks. Rarely is she shown in a place of authority, technical excellence.
Apart from the gratuitous violence, our biggest casualty became an entire generation of young men in the audience not having seen well rounded, real, women on screen. The tragedy here is best explained in this tweet:
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this in my opinion has increased the stress and angst of the young Kannadiga male, creating the pressure to live up to his Macho idols, to have the same strength, charm and magnetism, while diminishing the image of the Kannadiga woman, also to the detriment of their psyche.
With that, I will take a break now. Not sure when I will continue :D But I would like to touch upon the Travelling urban male of the 2000's and how even that stems from a sense of alienation from Bangalore for the average Kannadiga. I hope this wasn't boring, I tend to ramble.
So, tata, sirigannadam gelge. Please watch, critique Kannada films and implore the creators to do better. This won't happen without a proactive audience.
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