cinema and a few films

I am a cine-buff and have been for a long time. Much of my aesthetic education has come from cinema and film appreciation. I love movies also because they offer me the chance to enter into another reality, culture and/or sub-culture, be emotionally impacted by it and to learn from it. I feel compelled to speak about some of the movies that changed my life.

I must talk about the movies made by master film maker Andrei Tarkovsky. He is Russian, but the culture he presents in his films is not just Russian, but transpersonal. He is the only film maker I know who can grasp the ethereal quality of transpersonal dimensions and convey it so beautifully and evocatively. Ingmar Bergman was quoted as saying: "Tarkovsky for me is the greatest [of us all], the one who invented a new language, true to the nature of film, as it captures life as a reflection, life as a dream". He made only seven feature films and each is a memorable journey stamped indelibly on my mind. Some scenes that left me gasping were : In ‘Mirror’ the young mother sits on the fence and the tall grass parts with the wind and an other presence is felt, in ‘Sacrifice’ the camera zooms out from the house in the frame and we see it is a toy version of the ‘real’ larger house a shift in perspective that boggles the mind. ‘Andrei Rublev’ on the life of a 15th century icon painter portrays the struggle the artist goes through as he questions his faith. ‘Solaris’ takes us to an extra-terrestrial location, where the planet is a living, knowing organism that takes the material of your dreams and presents life-like versions of the dream characters. All his films offer a mirror into the soul and they awakened an awareness of the transpersonal dimensions and a sense of indescribable beauty, much before any experiments with psychedelics or any experience with meditation. Any one interested in the transpersonal would definitely benefit by seeing his movies as he captures what is often so elusive and almost abstract and gives a veritable experience of such realities.

The films of Pedro Almodovar are almost on the other end of the spectrum. Spanish in setting and context they revolve around themes of sexuality (homosexual, bisexual and transexual), desire, passion, identity, love and death. They tend to be melodramatic stories with complex narratives about people on the fringes of society. The films can be hysterically funny, but remain compassionate to his characters. Outrageous, provocative, irreverent, whacky, sexy, kinky, dark, offbeat etc. are some adjectives that describe his films. ‘Women on the verge of a nervous breakdown’ a witty, whacky movie about high-strung, headstrong women and their modern love relationships, ‘All about my mother’ about a single mother grieving the loss of her only son, ‘Bad education’ about the sexual misconduct perpetrated by the catholic church, ‘Talk to her’, ‘Volver’, and many more are part of his oeuvre. His films give me insights into marginalized people and LGBT community.

And now I am going to talk in one breath about the Indie movies by westerners. ‘Water’ talks about real issues of Hindu widows, ‘Monsoon Wedding’ is set in the context of a middle/upper-middle class urban household and looks at incest, ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ about a boy from the slums, who makes it big and ‘Mississipi Masala’ is about ABCDs i.e. American Born Confused Desis. Although they are by different directors (including Indians, but Non Resident Indians) and have highly varied themes the perspective they offer is skewed in that it is India seen through a foreigner/westerner’s eyes. I was particularly triggered by a scene in ‘Slumdog’, where the child climbs down into a pile of shit to catch a glimpse of ‘The’ iconic superstar AB. Admittedly Indians go overboard in worshipping their celebrities, but this scene is beyond gross. It also triggers the ‘dirty Indian’, ‘filthy pig’ slurs used by the British during their rule and is definitely offensive to Indians. Although A. R. Rehman is no doubt highly talented and deserves an Oscar the film is defintitely not his best work. The tracks in 'Delhi 6' for example are far more complex, nuanced and experimental too.

the film also offers a different view, as do others by Indian directors. 'Delhi-6’ is about a New Yorker adapting to life in Old Delhi, ‘Swades’ a NASA scientist returns to native India to find his roots, ‘Chak De! India’ about a women’s hockey team dynamics and an inspiring coach, ‘Luck by Chance’ about the Bombay film scene, ‘Omkara’ Shakespeare’s Othello adapted to the outlaw world in an Indian village to name a few. I highly recommend these as more ‘authentic’ versions of the Indian culture.