Filmi Geek

Garm hava (1973)

गरम हवा

While many fine movies have addressed the disruptive forces of Partition, M.S. Sathyu's Garm hava ("hot wind") is almost unique in its focus on the experiences of Muslims.  It is not by any stretch a cheery film - but there are some heartrending stories that nevertheless need to be told. 

The Mirza family is divided in the aftermath of Partition.  Though they have long made their home in Agra, the prospects for Muslims in post-Partition India are not encouraging, and some of the family want to start anew across the border in Pakistan.  Halim Mirza (Dinanath Zutshi), once a political leader fiercely determined to preserve a Muslim presence in India, has finally given up and fled.  This leaves his brother Salim (Balraj Sahni) as head of the household, looking after the family's shoemaking business and the haveli in which they live.  The business is struggling - many of the workers have left India, and some Hindus refuse to do business with Salim.  He cannot secure financing - lending to Salim is too risky, the bankers say, because other Muslims haven taken loans and disappeared across the border.  Soon the family loses the haveli as well - its deed is in Halim's name, and because of his emigration the government claims the haveli as abandoned property. 

As time goes on, the family's lot only worsens.  Unwilling to join a shoemakers' demonstration in favor of a lucrative government tender, Salim is locked out of the tender when it is granted.  Meanwhile, Salim's daughter Amina (Geeta Siddharth) nurses a heart broken by Partition.  She is in love with Halim's son Kazim (Jamal Hashmi), who is arrested when he crosses the border back into India to marry her.  Salim's son Sikandar (Farooq Shaikh), a recent graduate, cannot find work because of both anti-Muslim prejudice and the unstable economy, and becomes increasingly involved in politically radical activities. As the hardships mount, Salim and his wife (Shaukat Kaifi) consider joining Halim in Pakistan, but Agra is their home, and they are determined to stay as long as the dire circumstances will allow.   

The repercussions of Partition through the Mirza family are like fault lines, cracks in firm earth resonating outward from a single point of thunderous impact.  Though Garm hava traces each of these lines, it places the burden of all of them on Salim, and they are beautifully rendered in the sad creases of Balraj Sahni's face.

The Hindus who impede the Mirza family's efforts to right their economic ship are, for the most part, disembodied voices.  A banker who refuses to lend, a landlord offering exorbitant and discriminatory rental terms, an employer advising Sikander to go find work in Pakistan "among your own kind" - all these are dehumanized forces denying the Mirza family an honorable livelihood.  One of the few Hindus who is given a face, and some depth, is the wealthy businessman Ajmani (A.K. Hangal).  Ajmani certainly takes advantage of the Mirza family's straits - he buys the haveli on the cheap after the government confiscates it - but he also shows ambivalence about doing so, and attempts to support the family in other ways. His personal kindness to them, however, does not outweigh the demands of business.  The message may be that even Hindus who wish to extend a cordial hand to Muslims are constrained by the broader post-Partition climate. As a voice-over announces in the beginning of the film, "No one heeds the Gita; no one heeds the Koran" - and yet, the difference between these two texts both drives and limits the conduct of everyone in the new nation. 

The visual style of the film is arresting - artfully framed scenes full of contrast and visual symbolism reminiscent of Satyajit Ray.  Some of these scenes make use of the fine slits and shadows of the haveli's old purdah, which only the family's frail, aged matriarch still sits behind - the other women of the family move about the house freely among the men. The purdah itself represents the sharp line between the old and the new - the matriarch, too weak to leave the haveli much less flee India, cannot (or refuses to) fully fathom the depth of the changes wrought by Partition; on the other side of the curtain, the rest of the family struggles to adapt to them.

Garm hava also makes exquisite use of the beautiful monuments in and near Agra that were built by Muslims, such as the Taj Mahal and Fatehpur Sikri.  The explicit citation of these Muslim contributions to Indian pride and history is unsubtle, and the film acknowledges it explicitly in one of Halim's fiery political speeches shown in flashback early in the film. But it does conjure a pointed image - the possibility of India completely empty of Muslims, with these grand, breathtaking monuments standing in mute or even mocking testimony to the memory of an erased people.  The conclusion, in stark apposition to that image, must be that Muslims are too tightly woven into the fabric of India's history and greatness for there to be any sense or justice in driving them all out. 

The Blue Umbrella (2005)

Like his film Makdee, Vishal Bhardwaj's The Blue Umbrella is a story about a child, though it is not as explicitly a children's story as that wonderful fable.  Nor is it as decidedly a grown-up story as his Shakespeare adaptations Omkara or Maqbool.  However one characterizes this film, though, one thing is certain - I need to see more Vishal Bhardwaj films.  

In a picturesque town in the mountain state of Himachal Pradesh lives a little girl named Biniya (Shreya Sharma).  Biniya does what most little girls do - runs around and plays with the other children, and bargains for candy and treats with the keeper of the local snack stand, Nandu (Pankaj Kapur).  One day, on the mountainside outside the village, Biniya finds a beautiful umbrella, and is entranced by its sky-blue watercolors, delicate papery canopy, its bamboo ribs and sensuous ruffles.  When the Japanese tourist to whom it belongs finds her, Biniya trades her precious good luck charm - a bear claw - for the umbrella, and brings the marvelous artifact back to the village. 

There, Biniya becomes the center of all attention, as children and adults alike are fascinated by the umbrella.  Nandu covets it, and offers her all the toffees and biscuits she can eat in exchange for it - but Biniya isn't selling.  Then one day Biniya's heart breaks - she turns her back on the umbrella for a few short moments, and it vanishes.  When Nandu obtains a nearly identical umbrella - his is red - from a foreign seller, Biniya vibrates with rageful suspicion, and determines to prove that Nandu is a thief. 

There are so many marvelous touches in this short little film that it's difficult to single out a few without feeling guilty for giving others short shrift.  It is visually stunning, with a rich palate and carefully-constructed shots that deliver beauty and symbolism in equal parts.  In one scene, Biniya brandishes the umbrella like a kung-fu master to protect her older brother - himself a powerful champion wrestler - from a coiling cobra.  In another of the many lovely scenes, Nandu tries, without success, to bribe Biniya with a bunch of balloons.  The brightly colored balloons float slowly away like Nandu's dreams as he stands, small and beige and still, before the grey backdrop of a rocky waterfall. 

Indeed, Bhardwaj uses the picturesque village and its breathtaking natural surroundings to great effect, creating a dreamlike or fable-like quality even while presenting day to day village life in charming and engaging vignettes throughout the story. And while most of the characters are not fleshed out - the 90-minute running time does not afford very much deep character development - Nandu and Biniya are, as much through expressive silences as through any dialogue.  In this way, the film bears some similarity to Bhardwaj's delicious Makdee, presenting village life with some vividness, along with the maturation of a child's spirit in opposition to a stubborn and cruel adult.  Unlike the witch in Makdee, though, Nandu has some nuance of his own.  Sour as the pickles he relishes, this bitter little man is nevertheless moved to poetry by the beauty of the umbrella, which he rhapsodizes in loving terms.

The film has some themes in common with The Gods Must Be Crazy and other stories of that ilk, in which a mysterious and desirable object of foreign origin invades a peaceful, tightly knit community and breeds unrest and mistrust among its residents.  The umbrella surely carries the allegorical force of the variety of outside influences that exert themselves on Indian village life, both foreign influences and those from other sectors of Indian society.  And in Biniya's village, where the villagers routinely entertain tourists (and sometimes even con them), there is enough resilience that in the end, the umbrella's upsetting influence can be calmed, and the umbrella integrated into the village's peaceful fabric, as Nandu changes the name of his snack stand from his surname "Khatri stall" to "Chatri stall" (umbrella stall).  

Guddi (1971)

गुड्डी

After a lengthy hiatus from viewing and writing about Hindi films, reviewing a movie dedicated to debunking filmy magic may not have be the best way to rekindle my own obsessive passions!  But Hrishikesh Mukherjee's Guddi ("doll") is a sweet enough movie, and its rather blunt-force anti-escapism message isn't enough to deter me from getting my head back into Bollywood. 

Kusum (Jaya Bhaduri), also called by the pet name Guddi, is a bright, studious, and mischievous  schoolgirl with a taste for the movies.  She is especially enamored of Dharmendra, and can't resist sneaking away from her studies to see his movies over and over again.  While studying the poet Mirabai in school, Kusum sees a parallel between her love for Dharmendra and Mira's eternal devotion to Krishna.  But Kusum's devotion to Dharmendra interferes with her family's plans to get her married to the kind young engineer Navin (Samit Bhanja).   Kusum's well-connected uncle (Utpal Dutt) arranges for her to spend time in a movie studio with Dharmendra (playing himself), watching him at work, in the hopes that she'll come to see that the movies are little more than carefully-manufactured fantasy.

What stands out most in Guddi is Jaya Bhaduri's performance.  Around 23 herself at the time of the shooting, she makes a very convincing girl of 16 or 17.  (It helps that she's often shot from a high angle, making her look shorter.)   Kusum flits rapidly between playfulness and petulance, projecting an air of girlishness that is at once endearing and exasperating.  When her serious sister-in-law (the only mother figure in her life) encourages her to be more demure and grown-up, Kusum complies hesitantly, but in her discomfort one can also perceive a powerful longing to reach maturity.  Kusum is very much a girl on the cusp - no longer a child, but not yet a woman - and Jaya ji's performance nails that tension exactly. 

As a wide-eyed fan of Hindi films myself, it's hard not to share Kusum's sense of wonder as she drives into Bombay and gawps at the beautifully-painted film hoardings that tower several stories above her head.  And her visit to the studios is at first equally enthralling and magical, as a parade of stars (Amitabh Bachchan, Ashok Kumar, Dilip Kumar, and others) provide cameo appearances in the form of takes from films that were shooting contemporaneously with Guddi.  But soon the smoke and mirrors of filmi fantasy begin to show themselves.  This is subtle at first - as when Rajesh Khanna repeatedly asks for his line during what purports to be a heartfelt declaration of love - and by the end the message is delivered with such force that even Kusum can't ignore it.  Seeing how the sausage is made puts a quick end to her starry-eyed fantasies. 

What makes Guddi less than satisfying is that while Kusum recovers from the childish crush, she nevertheless doesn't seem quite mature enough to be married.  Worse than that, there is no affordance for her naturally playful personality, and no room for her to still enjoy the movies even if she isn't obsessed with them.  I wish that Guddi could have left me with the feeling that Kusum had grown up without losing her essential spirit - but instead it leaves her growing up just like her dour, duty-bound sister-in-law.  Life with the serious Navin - who doesn't like movies at all - doesn't promise to be a whole lot of fun. 

Suhaag (1979)

सुहाग

Manmohan Desai has a knack for satisfying masala.  His movies are packed to the gills with his choice wacky elements and overloaded symbols - brothers separated in childhood, medically improbable blindness, gentleman rogues, grudges held for decades by heroes and villains alike.  Suhaag ("good fortune," particularly the sort of good fortune supposedly enjoyed by a married woman) is no exception, and if you check your brain at the door you will be rewarded with an amusing and goofy masala escape.

Durga (Nirupa Roy) is ruined when her husband, a gangster called Vikram (Amjad Khan), refuses to recognize their marriage and rejects their twin infant sons.  Matters get worse for Durga when a rival gangster Jaggi (Kader Khan) kidnaps one of the babies and sells him to a small-time crook (Jeevan) who makes his living exploiting child beggars.  Durga does her best to raise her remaining boy on her own, and he grows into Kishen (Shashi Kapoor), a devoted son and police officer of sparkling integrity.  The other boy, raised among petty thieves, becomes Amit (Amitabh Bachchan), a drunk and a con-artist.  Coincidence brings Amit together with Kishen and Durga, as he helps engineer a romance between Kishen and Anu (Parveen Babi), a sweet-hearted student who falls for Kishen.  For his part, Amit is in love with Basanti (Rekha), a recalcitrant tawaif with a secret connection to Anu. And things become very tangled indeed when Vikram resurfaces - he hires Amit to assassinate the meddling police inspector Kishen, unaware that either young man is his son. 

That plot, such as it is, is almost more trouble to describe than it is worth, something Suhaag has in common with other Manmohan Desai films like Amar Akbar Anthony and Parvarish.  It's enough to hang on to while it's happening, though.  After all, crazy coincidences are the bread and butter of masala - especially coincidences involving long-lost family members, which are particularly numerous here.  And for all its adherence to masala formula, Suhaag does offer a few rarer treats. For instance, Rekha's Basanti is one of the most appealing characters I've ever seen her play.  I am not a fan of Rekha's ephemeral, will-o-the-wisp persona, and in Basanti she offers a gutsy, earthy, worldly woman in sharp constrast to the aloof tawaif she played in Muqaddar ka sikandar - Basanti could have been a repeat performance of that character, and I was delighted that she was not.  

Durga, too, is a departure from Nirupa Roy's typical "Nahin!"-screaming maa roles - at least for the first half of Suhaag.  There, she is bold and forceful, taking charge and muttering snarky commentary; the sequence of scenes in which she meets Anu and tries to arrange Anu's marriage to Kishen is particularly wonderful.  Unfortunately, Durga's story is bookended by simpering devotion to her singularly undeserving husband Vikram.  This is Suhaag's great weakness; the movie lacks Amar Akbar Anthony's charming syncretism and paeans to Indian unity, as well as Parvarish's wry commentary on nature vs. nurture.  As a fan of Manmohan Desai's hearty message-masala, I felt baited and switched when the promising Durga was in some ways more Sita than Durga. 

Still Suhaag is fun when masala is on the menu - nothing else quite matches the buddy chemistry of Shashi and Amitabh ("Shashitabh," as the jodi is affectionately known in among Bollybloggers), who alone are worth watching for, and they plus the splendid songs ensure a satisfying, if silly, experience.  Of these, Parveen Babi's intoxicated turn in " Main to beghar hoon" and the buddy-jodi song "Ae yaar sun" are standouts, along with the hysterical "Tere rab ne bana di jodi," in which Amitabh and Rekha dance bhangra in disguise.

Dev.D (2009)

I almost gave up on Anurag Kashyap's Dev.D after the first half hour, when it threatened to be just another retread of the classic Devdas story - a story of a pathetic, unredeemable narcissist, a story that never resonated with me.  I was well rewarded for sticking with it.  This new adaptation makes some adjustments that, while small, nevertheless yield a far more satifying film Sanjay Leela Bhansali's execrable 2002 version.

The story of Dev.D is familiar, as Devdas is a Bengali tale that has been told many times both in Hindi film and in other Indian cinemas.  Dev and Paro are childhood friends, separated when Dev's family sends him to school abroad.  They remain in touch through his long exile, and upon his return, the young adult Dev (Abhay Deol) and Paro (Mahie Gill) find that their friendship has developed into strong romantic attraction.  They intend to marry, but social forces intervene.  In this version, Paro is led to doubt that Dev will want her because her family is of lower status than his, while Dev overhears an angry servant telling salacious tales about Paro and, electing to believe them, rejects her.  Paro marries a widower selected by her family, and Dev falls into a deep drug- and alcohol-fueled despair, in the company of a prostitute called Chanda (Kalki Koechlin), who cares for him despite his narcissism and his rage.

It is in the treatment of Dev's relationship with Chanda (Chandramukhi in more traditional versions of the story) that Kashyap's Dev.D improves over earlier renderings of the tale.  Chanda is given a heartbreaking backstory that offers her some substance and helps motivate her warmth for Dev.  And Dev, for a change, is permitted an arc; in contrast to the simpering, unchanging pile of misery in Bhansali's film, here he grows in Chanda's care.  Chanda analyzes Dev, seeing that he loved the idea of possessing Paro more than he loved Paro herself.  The film's best moments come when Chanda confronts Dev with his narcissism; he accepts her insight and evolves in response to it.

In addressing, rather than indulging, the flaws of Dev's character, Dev.D is elevated.  It is not merely a gritty retelling of the old tale, dressed up with frank sexuality, coarse language, and a rock soundtrack.  Instead, it's a touching and mostly believable story of two damaged people finding each other in the darkness of their anguished lives.  Paro is sidelined, compared to other tellings of the tale, but she isn't missed; the story is Dev's and Chanda's.  And when Paro does reappear in the film's second half, she too has grown; instead of wasting herself pining for Dev, she takes a maternal pity on him.  The result of giving these young characters a chance to develop is that Dev.D advances the Devdas legacy.  Like its characters, Dev.D learns from history, rather than wallowing in it. 

Loins of Punjab Presents (2007)

I waited almost a year for my chance to see this film, and the charming comedy was worth every minute of the wait.  11 months after its successful festival opening and notable 7-week run in Indian theaters, Manish Acharya's adorable and fun debut film, Loins of Punjab Presents, has finally begun a limited theatrical run in the United States.

Loins of Punjab, the largest distributor of pork loins on the east coast, is sponsoring a weekend-long talent contest called Desi Idol, and desi dreamers from all over New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut have descended on a humble New Jersey conference hotel to work their talents for a chance at the $25,000 prize.  The contestants include Sania Rehman (Seema Rahmani), a mediocre New York actress with Bollywood aspirations; Vikram Tejwani (Manish Acharya), a laid-off financial analyst who breaks down everything - including romance - into probabilities and statistics; Preeti Patel (Ishitta Sharma), a high school student suffocating under the thumb of her rigid, but loving, immigrant family; A gay hip-hop Bhangra dancer calling himself the Turbanotorious B.D.G. (Ajay Naidu); and Joshua Cohen (Michael Raimondi), an American admirer of Indian culture.  Joshua enters the contest at the urging of his girlfriend Opama Menon (Ayesha Dharker), who soon grows less supportive when she realizes he is the ridicule of the Indian contestants. 

The film's delight is in the detail with which each of these characters, and even the many others who come and go throughout the film, are painted.  Although Acharya draws on stereotypes, he does so with deep affection for the many-faceted NRI culture from which the stereotypes arise.  And more importantly, he does so with great original humor; the jokes are not merely based upon the stereotypes, but are built upon them in satisfying layers.  So while there are broad laughs to be had from such moments as a Gujarati uncle asking for "wedge snakes" (his mispronounced version of "vege snacks") or Sania's inability to string together a sentence in Hindi despite her Bollywood dreams, there is subtler humor as well - like a running joke of desi characters taking Joshua for a waiter, or the poignant jokes about the contestant called Saddam Hussein, a security specialist who can't get work because of his unfortunate name.  This sort of joke adds a slight tinge of edginess to the humor, hinting at the darker aspects of life as a desi in America, without burdening the film with too much preachy politics. 

Of course the main attraction for me is the vicious socialite, Mrs. Rrita Kapoor (Shabana Azmi), for whom no tactic is too low if it will help her win the contest.  She intends to donate the prize money to her pet charity - if only to upstage a generous donation by her chief rival in her high-tone social scene - but her noble intentions can't compensate for the dirty pool she plays.  Her performance is as broad and scene-chewing as any in her career, and watching it almost is almost as much fun for us as giving it seems to have been for her.  But notwithstanding my own Shabana-centric reasons for awaiting this film so eagerly, no one character stole the show.  They are all likeable (well, except Mrs. Kapoor), sweet, and very, very funny. 

The resolution of Loins of Punjab Presents carries a warm-hearted message which, in one of the film's many clever and funny twists, is incoherently verbalized by its dumbest character.  If you have the opportunity to see it, you should.  It is an outstanding debut film, full of smiles and "awwww"s, and deserves to be picked up for broader distribution. 

Main Azaad hoon (1989)

मैं आज़ाद हँ

Main Azaad hoon ("I am Azaad"), one of a very few Javed Akhtar films that Shabana Azmi appeared in, is an interesting rumination on how an ordinary - and anonymous - man can be moved to tremendous sacrifice by the plight of his fellow human beings.   

Publisher Gokulchand's (Manohar Singh) newspaper is not selling, and his columnist Subhashni (Shabana Azmi) is facing the ax.  To boost the paper's sales - and to save her job - quick-thinking Subhashni concocts and publishes a letter from a fictional man named Azaad - the name means "independent" - who threatens to kill himself in protest against social injustice throughout the state.  Azaad is an immediate sensation throughout the city, and Subhashni pens more letters, creating an entire backstory for the fictional man.  Gokulchand is delighted with the result in the paper's bottom line, and to keep the charade going he authorizes Subhashni to find a suitable man they can pay to play the role of Azaad.  Subhashni discovers a charismatic vagabond (Amitabh Bachchan) who is willing to take on the role in exchange for a few good meals and a generous handful of rupees.  Azaad's mystique grows, and everyone with a grievance seeks his aid, from slumdwellers in search of clean water to striking factory workers clamoring for a living wage.  Azaad is moved by these causes, and soon he is acting from his heart instead of merely acting the part that Gokulchand and Subhashni have paid him to play.  And his heart is tested when the power players who created him try to use him as a pawn for their own advantage.

Main Azaad hoon's script is little too wordy; there were places where the story dragged.  But Javed sahib's award-winning dialogues deliver with the expected style the film's statements against manipulation of the common man by those in power  - like when one character, an elected official, says that the key to politics is to "make promises to the poor, and make deals with the rich."   Subhasnhi's character arc in particular is compelling.  She starts out just as manipulative as the power players - she is very shrewd in fact, acting in calculation of her own interests only, and is not moved until she sees Azaad willing to commit himself to the fullest for the rights of others.

Indeed, there are parallels to Shabana Azmi's own experience built into Subhashni's story that are so striking I had to wonder if Javed sahib didn't write the script with his wife in mind.  Subhashni begins with the view that her newspaper column is strictly entertainment for the masses.  As the film wears on, she struggles to keep entertainment separate from social responsibility, just as Shabana Azmi herself did, and, again like Shabana, ultimately follows her heart in the direction of activism.  The film contains parallels between Azaad and Amitabh Bachchan too - in one scene, Azaad emerges from his rooms to find an overwhelming crowd of supplicants awaiting darshan; I have read about such crowds at Amitabh's own home, especially in the early 1980s.

Javed Akhtar once said that Hollywood films are short stories while Hindi films are novels. But the characterizations and scope of Main Azaad hoon are, in some ways, more like the former.  Rather than offering reels of epic backstory, Azaad's true origin and life story remain a complete mystery.  We learn a little about Subhashni's father - he was a hero, a freedom fighter on the eve of independence - but no friends or relatives of hers are present in the film.  By filmi standards, the two principals are unanchored and lonesome (though Azaad has a sidekick who makes a few appearances) - these loners are given their sense of purpose by devoting themselves to a wider community to which neither fully belongs. 

Hey Ram (2000)

हे राम

Kamal Haasan's daring, intense film Hey Ram draws heavily on the symbology of Hindu myths to tell its story about the spasms surrounding partition.  Even though much of that layered meaning is shamefully lost on me, the film's commentary on sectarian violence - an issue that always gets to me - is both compelling and moving.

Saket Ram (Kamal Haasan) is an archeologist, a scholar and an intellectual.  Though he is a Tamil Brahmin by birth, his own political beliefs are open, progressive, and secular.  Ram's ideology is shaken to the core, though, when, in rioting following the announcement of Partition, his beloved wife Apurna (Rani Mukherjee) is brutally raped and murdered by a Muslim gang.  Ram is distraught to the point of madness, and he wanders the streets of Calcutta in a daze.  He is recognized as a fellow Brahmin by a charismatic Hindu nationalist, Abhyankar (Atul Kulkarni), who tells him that revered hero Mahatma Gandhi is true cause for the violence.  Abhyankar convinces Ram that obliterating Gandhi would solve the "Muslim problem" once and for all and allow the creation of a great Hindu nation.  Ram, traumatized and thirsty to avenge his loss, joins Abhyankar's plot on the revered leader's life, and is selected to be the lone assassin.  His quest to fulfill what he perceives to be his destiny brings him face to face with an old friend - his former colleague, a Muslim, Amjad Ali Khan (Shah Rukh Khan) - and in the heat of battle Ram must decide where his true loyalties lie. 

Ram's arc is driven by his extended case of post-traumatic stress disorder; recurring visions of Apurna's violent demise haunt him and goad him in his descent from humanist man of science to the incarnation of a vengeful impulse.  The film is rife with images of masculinity, as if Ram feels less of a man for having failed to save his beloved wife from the rioters.  The pull of the Hindutva ideology on Ram is presented as a way to restore his manhood.  In his dreams he is beefcakey, bare-chested and strong.  In one arresting sequence, after he makes love to his new wife she transmutes into an enormous rifle in his arms.  And when Ram's Hindutva group plots the assassination, the group's leader (a deposed maharaja whose motivations are closer to bitterness and greed than to ideology) exhorts Ram to show the world that Hindus are "real men," not "effeminate lovers of truth."

While the powerful imagery (as well as the names of some of the characters) suggest analogues to the Ram of mythology that I don't fully understand, I can grasp the film's larger point:  Sectarian violence as a whole, says the film, is a hallucinatory spasm of PTSD, and only real connections with family and friends can stop it.  Indeed, Ram's first attempt on Gandhi's life is interrupted by his father-in-law, and it's the strong pull of his friendship with the Muslim Amjad that finally snaps him out of his Hindutva torpor.  Ram's true ideology seems to be the progressive, humanist one he expresses at the beginning of the film; his Hindutva phase is presented as a trauma-induced hallucination, taken advantage of by the darker forces in the film. 

The film supports all these rich layers of narrative with very good performances by a vast, accomplished cast - in addition to those mentioned above there are brief appearances by the likes of Hema Malini, Girish Karnad, Om Puri, and Naseeruddin Shah as Gandhi.  Ilaiyaraja's soundtrack is memorable too, especially the haunting "Janmon ki jwala," in which Ram reminisces about Apurna.  Even with the limitations of my own inadequate background, Hey Ram is a powerful story, well told. 

Mother India (1957)

The exquisite sacrifice that is the life of an Indian woman is a common and moving theme upon which many great Hindi films are based, from Amar Prem to Lajja.  And the mother of all these films may be Mother India, in which an Indian woman survives an almost unimaginable series of hardships and rejuvenates an entire village with her own backbreaking work, only to face the ultimate sacrifice - one she must make not only for her family, but for the good of the entire community.  

Radha (Nargis) marries the handsome Shamu (Raaj Kumar) and settles well into life with his solid agrarian family.  She soon learns, though, that her mother-in-law mortgaged the farm to pay for her and Shamu's lavish wedding celebrations.   The moneylender Sukhi Lala (Kanhaiyalal) claims three-fourths of the farm's produce, having tricked Radha's illiterate mother-in-law into signing a usurious contract.  As the family grows - Radha has three children - it becomes more and more difficult to subsist on their meager share.  The hardships multiply, leaving Radha and her children alone, homeless, and starving.  They survive through Radha's own tireless hard work, and her sons grow into strong young men, though each is scarred in his own way by the traumatic experiences of his childhood.  The spirited Birju (Sunil Dutt) is mischievous and temperamental; he is hungry to seek revenge from Lala, who still claims the lion's share of their produce.  The solemn Ramu (Rajendra Kumar) is protective of his mother and reflects her values, relying on hard work to make his way.  The tension between the two philosophies sets the stage for the film's ultimate conflict, as Birju's rash, violent nature clashes head-on with his mother's stern, grounded integrity. 

Mother India is a beautiful film, shot in beautiful brown and orange tones that both highlight the majesty of the rural Indian landscape and bring to life the grit and heat of working the soil.  The themes lend themselves to an abundance of iconic and symbolic images - Radha hauling a plow that is meant to be hauled by an ox; Radha standing neck-deep in flood waters, hefting her young children over her head on a pallet.  And Nargis, as Radha - really as the titular Mother India - is in absolute top form.  She is the epitome of badass filmi womanhood; she is simply fierce.  Nargis has crafted a performance that is melodrama at its finest, focused and heightened emotions that magnify the viewer's sense of Radha's experience.  Indeed, the multiplying calamities that befall poor Radha can be hard to watch - there are times when the story is so bleak it seems hard to carry on. 

Still, there is a current of hopefulness as well.  Radha's story is told in flashback; the film opens with the villagers asking Radha, now an old woman, to bless the inauguration of the village's new canal.  "You are the mother of us all," the villagers plead with the recalcitrant old woman.  And so the viewer knows, from the outset, that Radha not only will survive her trials, but will come to hold a revered place as the savior of the village.  Radha shoulders the burden of rearing her family and restoring a village upheaved, in what is surely a metaphor for the construction of modern India and healing the fresh wounds of Partition.  And so the film's message is, as it must be, that once Mother India has made the difficult decisions and painful sacrifices, those of her children that remain will be squarely on the road to prosperity. 

The film's second half is as much about Radha's sons as it is about Radha; much time is devoted to developing their contrasting approaches to reconciling with the past and preparing for the future.  The hot-headed Birju thirsts for revenge and lives in the moment; Ramu is practical, methodical, and hardworking.  The film is abundantly clear in its endorsement of the latter philosophy.  And yet as much as Birju frustrates her, Radha adores him; as in Deewaar, Mother India favors her miscreant son over her honest one.  The only limit Radha sets for her indulgence of Birju is one that reflects the film's girl power subtext:  "You may do as you like and I will always love you," she tells him, "but don't you dare ever disrespect a woman."

These comments are quite long enough, but I have to add a few words about Mother India's beautiful music.  The songs encapsulate the agrarian beauty of the film and present delightful tableaux of idealized life in a farming village.  While they don't stand alone - there are no singular dances or set pieces that stand out in my memory (except perhaps the Holi song) - they add texture, and in the film's darker moments, respite, to an already lovely movie. 

Mr. India (1987)

What happens when two masters of populist, allegorical, entertaining screenwriting and a gifted, creative, intellectual director put their heads together with the goal of creating a film that is over-the-top even compared to the most outrageous masala Hindi films have to offer?   Mr. India is what happens.  Screenwriters Salim-Javed and director Shekhar Kapur, with some intrepid help from a terrific cast, pulled out every stop in this all-out goofy entertainer.  It's self-conscious, it's ridiculous, and it's riotous fun - but there's a patriotic moral, too. 

Arun Verma (Anil Kapoor) is a musician with a cheerful disposition who looks after a houseful of adorable orphans.  When his natural charm ceases to satisfy the shopkeepers and landlords from whom he wrangles rice and credit, he sets out to find himself a paying guest to supplement his income.  He rents a room to a persnickety, child-hating reporter named Seema (Sridevi) and they proceed to get on one another's nerves.  Soon Arun learns that his father, a scientist who died when Arun was a small boy, had been killed by some goons intent on stealing an invisibility formula the scientist had devised.  Now the goons are back, at the behest of their despotic boss, Mogambo (Amrish Puri), and they want not only the invisibility formula but all of India to boot.  Arun learns of the terrorist tactics of Mogambo's thugs, who use such nefarious tools as tainted food supplies and explosive-rigged toys to sow the seeds of fear in the populace, and he decides to use the invisibility formula to mete out justice against Mogambo's army of evildoers, transforming himself into Mr. India, the invisible avenger of the people.

The best parts of Mr. India are the moments that are crafted with no purpose other than to showcase the stars' first-class shtick.  In one delightful sequence, for example, Sridevi launches into an extended Charlie Chaplin impression that highlights her talent for adorable physical comedy; in others, she flings her dangerous curves across the screen in both a comical dance sequence and a passionate one.  Amrish Puri is at his bug-eyed, scene-chewingest best in every one of Mogambo's scenes, preening and strutting and ingeiously crafting a seemingly limitless number of ways to utter the villain's signature phrase, "Mogambo khush hua." ("Mogambo is pleased.")  These elements are brazenly, unabashedly entertaining in the manner in which Hindi films are particularly excellent; it is art without artifice.  Even the big-hearted sweetness Anil Kapoor shows nurturing his passel of adorable orphans is calculated more to win the hearts of the audience than to support the story. 

But for all its wanton crowd-pleasing, Mr. India is still a Salim-Javed film, and so the masala can be expected to be served up with an edge and with a generous side helping of social message.  The former manifests in Salim-Javed's willingness to kill even some of their most loveable characters; the latter in Arun Verma's declaration, as the invisible force called Mr. India, of the power of the "aam hindustani," the ordinary Indian.  The film's central message that larger-than-life forces of bloodshed and terror - represented by the larger-than-life Mogambo - can be stopped by the invisible yet undeniable power of the compassionate Indian citizen who looks out for the interests of his compatriots.  Mogambo's critical error is to presume that Arun Verma loves his own life more than he loves his country; Arun's patriotism and his love for every citizen of India, is Mogambo's downfall.  That's a heavy message indeed, that the commitment of the aam hindustani can defeat the devil himself; Mr. India works by lightening the load, delivering it in an outlandish and fun package. 

Mr. India was my (long overdue) first Sridevi film, and for the record I absolutely can see what all the fuss is about.  The three segments mentioned above - the Charlie Chaplin scene, the fantastic comedy number "Hawa Hawai," and the sensual song "Kaate nahin kate yeh din yeh raat" together represent a very nice sampling of her abilities.  She is adorable and precise, thrillingly sexy and at the same time uproariously funny.  It is Sridevi's misfortune that she reigned during a particularly bleak period of Hindi films, but I am nevertheless eager for more of her.