http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?story_id=5053447
Deep trouble Oct 20th 2005 | BUSAN, SOUTH KOREA >From The Economist print edition An Indian film stars at the world's biggest festival of Asian film Getty Images Now she can laugh WATER is the third part of an elemental trilogy by Deepa Mehta, an Indian director with a reputation for liking hot potatoes. Fire, one of her earlier films, tackled lesbianism, and Earth, the still sensitive subject of India's partition. In Water, she turns to the plight of India's widows, who are often regarded as non-persons. Though suttee has been illegal for a long time, many widows still suffer under an extreme interpretation of a 2,000-year-old Hindu tradition whereby a wife is half of her husband and when he dies, she is in effect half-dead too, and should be consigned to an ashram or house of confinement. After the script of Water was passed by India's official censor in 2000, shooting began in the holy city of Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh. However, Hindu fundamentalists were quick to protest, burning down the main set and seizing and destroying all prints and the original negative of the film. With no insurance cover, Ms Mehta had to abandon her project. But she remained undaunted, and spent the next few years raising the money to shoot the film again. A Canadian businessman came to the rescue and Water was remade in Sri Lanka, using a bogus working title as a precaution. It also required a new cast since one of the leading characters, a child, had grown into an adolescent in the interim. Advertisement Was it all worth it? Absolutely. Water combines a humanist message, political courage and visual poetry in a way not seen since the death of Satyajit Ray. It is the finest Indian film for a generation. The story is told through the eyes of a six-year-old girl who is sent to an ashram after the husband she had barely known suddenly dies. Still a child, all she craves is her mother, but even this is denied her. The child's story is paralleled with that of another widow, who falls in love with and expects to marry a high-caste idealist but commits suicide when his father advises him not to rock the boat and to take her as a mistress instead. The film is set in the 1930s against India's growing independence movement, and its conclusion is more upbeat than you might expect. Mahatma Gandhi, on a stop at the local station, makes an impassioned call for reform which inspires the child-bride and the now bereaved lover to flee the town together and accompany Gandhi to a brighter future. Like La Terra Trema and The Battleship Potemkin, Water uses great artistry to challenge orthodox views. It is in the grand humanist tradition of Ray, Ms Mehta's mentor, and Vittorio De Sica. The young girl who brings a wizened and dying widow a piece of fruit to see her safely into the next world is a tribute to Ray's first film Pather Panchali. Ms Mehta was applauded last week at the tenth Pusan film festival. Ray would have been proud. "We neglect our cities at our peril. For, in neglecting them, we neglect the nation." -John F. Kennedy ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Get fast access to your favorite Yahoo! Groups. Make Yahoo! your home page http://us.click.yahoo.com/dpRU5A/wUILAA/yQLSAA/iyUplB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Explore, Experience, Enjoy A.R.Rahman - The Man, The Music, The Magic. Only at arrahmanfans.com - The definitive A.R.Rahman e-community. Homepage: http://www.arrahmanfans.com Admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/arrahmanfans/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
