Amu, Doshi and “the Indian Voice”
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Cinema is perhaps the most commercial entertainment medium in the world. So many people make their living from it and more than a few their fortunes. And yet, there are some people who struggle to survive in this business simply because they choose to eschew the herd mentality and stick to their convictions. They make personal sacrifices in terms of time, money and energy, and at the end of it are not sure if their work will even be seen.
Throughout the history of cinema, it is this tribe that has actually helped the medium evolve. They give courage to others to walk down similarly unchartered paths, even though that is just a side-effect. Their real reason for doing what they do is that they can’t help getting obsessed with telling these stories in this way.
Two films from very different spaces is proof that this tribe is alive and well. Amu is not a new film; I’d seen it twice before – during the MAMI film festival in 2005 and in the theatres a few months later when it was released. Doshi is a full length documentary feature on one of India’s most important architects – Dr Balkrishna V. Doshi who is based in Ahmedabad.
For some reason, the DVD of Amu took three years to come into stores. But the wait is worth it because of two reasons. One, it is the best DVD package I’ve seen of an Indian film – the special features are very interesting and inspiring. Two, because my third viewing was surprisingly even more enjoyable than before – this is a film worth savouring. It is unusual enough that a Bengali couple chose to do everything in their power to make a film about the riots of 1984 where Sikhs were lynched all around Delhi as a reaction to Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Both Shonali Bose the director (a former activist and a film student) and her husband Bedabrata Pain the producer (a NASA scientist) went through personal sacrifices and setbacks to get this film made (the story of which makes the special features interesting). It was a personal mission for Shonali to make this film as she had lived through these riots in Delhi before going to the US in the 1990s.
The special thing about Amu is its soul. For me, the film is as much about this very important moment in history which has been brushed under the carpet in India as it is about creating wonderful “everyday moments” cinema. The sequences in the lead character’s (played characteristically superbly by Konkona Sen Sharma) home, with its quintessentially Bengali characters, has some of the most natural and delightfully candid performances I have been in any Indian film. Many from this ensemble cast were inexperienced or non actors, but the chemistry of their interactions remains the most memorable element in the film for me. The others in the cast are also excellent, as is the simple, no-cleverness story-telling. The film ends with a long single shot, which is courageously imaginative and moving. Amu is right up there with Monsoon Wedding as my favourite NRI film (and among my favourite Indian films) and I know I will always queue up for whatever Shonali Bose makes in the future. For now, I strongly recommend getting the DVD (as much for the special features as the film).
Doshi is a different kettle of fish. The non fiction film is a series of interviews with this eminent architect in different spaces, showcasing his work and ideas, and people associated with him. The film is intellectually stimulating as the subject’s ideas and the bigger pictures around them take people not connected to this field through unchartered terrain. And it is one of the most evolved minds in the field too – Mr Balkrishna Doshi is an internationally famous figure with an illustrious career that began as an apprentice to Le Corbusier. The film opens up spaces in the mind the way the documentary Helvetica did for people not entirely familiar with graphic design and typography. And yet, for a film of this kind of subject matter, the heart in it is surprising.
It is not just the thoughts on architecture that holds the viewer but Doshi’s views on life – about Indianness and quintessentially Indian ways of looking at the world, and the man himself – the warmth with which people remember their association with him, and indeed the warmth he himself radiates. One of the most beautiful moments in the film is his daughter’s emotional recollection of her father’s role in her childhood, and even adulthood. At the end of the day, it is like meeting an exceptionally wise and thoughtful person and getting to know him, his worldviews and his varied concerns – not a bad way at all to spend 85 minutes of your life.
Premjit Ramachandran, who has made this film (his first) on an absolute shoestring, is not an ordinary “career filmmaker”, nor is this a regular “stepping stone film”. The guy has shot, edited and directed the film himself (and very well). He has also composed and recorded the considerable music in the film himself. On top of this, he is a very highly rated professional graphic designer, the evidence of which can be seen right through the film. Whilst the film is an excellent outlet for all these creative energies coming together, the real motivation to make the film was apparently something else. Premjit’s brother Bijoy, also an architect, wanted to pay homage to his mentor, but even more importantly, felt a great need to document the workings of an extraordinary Indian mind. The film is still looking for the right distributor but there are screenings being organized all around the world. If you’re lucky enough to come across one, please do not miss it.
Perhaps the impetus for those films, their origins and intents are the reason why they resonate with clear-eyed honesty. There are enough people around to question nitty-gritty creative choices, bursting forth with opinions that seem to negate subjectivity and reduce story-telling to a science. But if one can rise above this dimwit din (the kind who are averse to clich'©d phrases but not clich'©d thoughts), there’s a lot to enjoy and value in these two films.
It is very important that Indian voices such as these are heard. But will they, in a climate like ours? Forget about the large-scale lifting that happens in our cinema from the West, and lately even the East – that is old hat now. What about the tendency to look at other cinemas for inspiration, the “Masters” and the award-winners for motivation? Is the proliferation of the great World Cinema titles from Palador and NDTV Lumiere and movie channels like UTV World Movies good for this climate? Will they freeze the muse or free it up? Given the low self-esteem prevailing in India about our ability to be original, will many feel intimidated at the prospect of never being able to match up to those standards and give up even before they’ve begun?
While it is absolutely wonderful to access the world’s best cinema in our own backyard, could it further deteriorate standards of originality in our quarters? Will it further discourage our storytellers from looking within and at life around them? Will it make people more interested in Charlie Kaufman’s latest film than in films like Doshi and Amu, which are so much more relevant to us?
This is not a case to stay frogs-in-the well (and certainly not to protest against such quality of cinema being available easily in India; of course they can change tastes and raise standards) but to understand what our priorities are. Our biggest film company sees no oddity in spending an obscene amount to produce a film with the biggest director in America, but has no desire to encourage new talents from its own backyard (a portfolio of at least twenty indigenous films of varied budget-sizes could be completed for the same amount). And the people who proudly bring this great international cinema to our doorstep with fanfare and social preening would without doubt ignore the same films if these were Indian and desperately looking for distribution (unless someone with a higher social standing than them suggested otherwise, which hardly happens anyway). The Indian point-of-view is too infra-dig for them, too lowbrow.
Our fiction scene is actually an even better example for this. For quite some time now, it has been even worse than our film scene, with almost all its talked-about writing being foreign-published, and therefore catering to a sensibility outside the life experience of the inhabitants of the subject matter of these very books (is there any surprise then that publishing is such a sorry business in India?) The last “big book” is the Booker-winner, Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger, which is actually an exception in one very significant way. After a long, long time this is a story that taps into something very real in the Indian reality – the simmering rage in the lower classes which is so latent that even they don’t know the extent to which it is there in them. Despite being foreign-published, this actually does great justice to the Indian voice (just like Amu did). But look at the reaction from our celebrated indigenous intelligentsia. Article after article tears into the book, castigating it for providing a “tourism view” of India, or for its gauche portrayal of India, the implication almost being that such a straightforward story (even though it is of a very complex and hugely important social phenomenon in India) embarrasses the literary-minded in India.
An even better example in fiction. I recently read a book called Bandicoots in the Moonlight by Avijit Ghosh – about a young adolescent boy growing up in small town Bihar in the 1970s. It is very funny and witty, and populated with lots of interesting, colourful characters. Most importantly, it is rooted and authentic, and provides a view to this milieu through a wonderful amused tone. It reminded me of Fellini’s Amarcord in more ways than one. Or of the celebrated American TV series The Wonder Years. And yet…have you even heard of the book? Its packaging is a joke in my opinion – the typical exotic-animal-or-food-item in the title and unobtrusive, “arty” pastel shades on the cover. It gives no clue to the pleasures inside, so it is highly unlikely that its mere presence on a bookshelf will make anyone pick it up. And the intelligentsia? Heaven forbid! How can they take an India-published book seriously? And that too without selling like Chetan Bhagat’s?
The problem is that the intelligentsia and the media matches indigenous work with the best known films and books internationally more in terms of technique and style than content. That is spectacularly missing the big picture because the purpose of cinema and writing is to express local voices first, the soul, not to advance literary techniques and writing styles.
In this climate, I am thankful that films like Doshi and Amu get made. The latter, with its NRI status, probably gained a lot from not having to negotiate and function in this environment. I hope Doshi finds a space where an important Indian voice is heard and not just recorded for a museum. And books like Bandicoots in the Moonlight are read and enjoyed for the different perspectives they bring and the pleasures they give.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Thanks for this. Will check out these films soon. Still waiting for the Hulla DVD on the Indian shelves though.
As of the new changes on the world cinema in our backyard, I think its time to test these waters. Bring ‘em on.
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thanks jaideep for this and hulla(have stopped tagging films that i like:))..i would just like to share that there are some like me who buy new writers books/movies with their first salaries
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Good 2 c ya back Jaideep!! Waiting for DVD release of HULLA
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Jaideep: “Bandicoots…” is on my to-read list. thanks for recommending it. I wrote my ‘The White Tiger’ post and then read your views on those who are trashing the book
Anyway, pls read my post and let me know your views as well.
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Subrat, have replied in your post. Tushar, Ajay, thanks. Hulla dvd is releasing around 23rd November by Moser Baer – so other end of the spectrum from multiplex spending (which I think is really hilarious, actually). Kshitij, it is people like you that many writers and filmmakers count on. Thanks for your comments.
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Yes Anjali, you’re absolutely right. Both these examples wannabe more than escapist.
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Thanks for sharing DOSHI with us.
I would love to watch the film. I Hope he gets distribution. Its gonna be very hard. There is no market for such films in India.
And its gonna be equally hard for him to get help from US because its not controversial or famous name. Besides West has enough of such films already.
But a film like this was made. Thats good enough for now. We need to document our own geniuses.
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I don’t think exposure to great world cinema will hinder anyone’s creativity or original voice. If you think watching all these great films will intimidate a true original voice, then thats the price we have to pay. Because if we are not aware of the best contemporary art around us, we might create something truly original in our own little pond, only to realise someone created the same art in Argentina 5 years back.
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U write so well Jaideep!
I really enjoyed reading this post.
I think they recently discussed ‘The White Tiger’ at a local radio station.
As for ‘Amu’, i’ve waited ages for that!
Konkona Sen is just something else. A fantastic performer.
If World cinema is shown on tv, maybe directors will be more reluctant to copy-paste, as the true source will be known.
And India, with its population of billions shouldn’t need to look for foreign inspiration!
Things do seem to be changing though.
Don’t u think?
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I think things are going from bad to worse… at least at the macro scale ! Great post Jaideep !
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Doshi huh?
hope it outlives them coffee tablebooks on him. this i gotta see
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Thanks for your comments, all.
@ Mainak and Steve, yes, you’re both right – there are obvious advantages to being exposed to great cinema (or any art, for that matter). I’m just saying, given how derivative we’ve become as a culture, it could do a lot of damage too, especially because we don’t lay a premium at all on originality. But none of this is a case against having all these films being available here, as I’ve mentioned in the post too.
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Anjali
Right ON…..
Responsibilty of an artist is to push the edges/boundaries. That can only happen if we know what are such boundaries right now.
Charlie Kaufman, RGV, Anurag Kashyap, Kanye West, Herzog, Radiohead, Greg Arakki, Maddona, Norman Cook are some names that comes to mind instantly as far as film & music goes.
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Anjali
you are my girl
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Anjali, whatever. It is too tiresome for me to get into an original vs derivative debate; the point here was to talk about these two films in that context. Most seem to get what I mean by derivative, if you don’t, that’s fine. Since the films mentioned above are “wannabe” and this piece lacks “intellectual rigour”, why not do something else with your time than keep showing up here?
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Anjali, relax. What Jaideep is doing here, after discounting all the supposedly intellectual-sounding words, is praising two films he really liked. One of them is a movie that tries to document the wrong done to the Sikhs in 1984, a shameful episode for all of us. By writing about it, by spreading the word, he is doing the right thing.
So many young people on this forum wouldn’t have been even born when the carnage happened. It is just another event for them in the History books. But it happened. Lives were lost. Many of your Sikh friends would know the pain, if you ask them. The movie is trying to document that difficult time, capture it for people who were not there as well as for those who bore the brunt. It is by no stretch of imagination trying to be a blockbuster like Dostana. It is just trying to put things on record, transmit truth, person by person. Any help in that regard, by verbal, written or any means whatsoever, is absolutely welcome.
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Anjali, i’ve been thinking about ur #14 comment all day.
It’s actually a very interesting way of viewing art/cinema and infact, the world.
I can see Jaideep’s initial point.
And I feel that there are a gazzilion topics India has yet to present to an audience.
There has to be.
And it’s already happening.
Ur point is very interesting and valid, but that in itself deserves a whole different post altogether.
But thanks for that.
U got my head rushing with new thoughts and ideas.
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Anjali, Comment 14. Very well worded and it is true. But the point put forth by you is on a different plane than what is intended here in the post in my understanding.
2 different takes on what is being original and being derivative by you and JV…
But nevertheless I liked the way you write…Made me think…Keep penning your thoughts here….
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@8: I’m not sure why one would go for mainstream distribution channels at all? The movie business has inexorably changed since the 80s and the only viable distribution for films like these is through the internet.
Having said that, artists and art filmmakers are touchy folks. They often carve out screening opportunities so that they are sure to get positive responses. Allowing your work to be judged freely requires courage.
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Jaideep, what happened to Hulla releasing on Moserbaer? 23rd November is long gone…A Wednesday!, and Mumbai Meri Jaan are out…what are they waiting for–>Hulla Bol
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