Amu - A movie by Shonali Bose
The other day I went and saw Amu at a local Multiplex. The film written, produced and directed by Shonali Bose is a story of a girl finding her roots.
Konkana Sen Sharma, who plays the main lead, Kaju, is a recent graduate from LA; coming to visit her cousin in Delhi, post 9/11. She visits the village where she was born, according to her adopted mother, played by Brinda Karat. The entire village migrated to Delhi after a severe malarial breakout.
But something doesn't seem right; Kaju has no memories of her time in the village. Coming back to city she explores the shanties with a friend of her cousin and stumbles across painful flashes of memory. Piecing together a shattered story she discovers her true origins to be a Sikh family, which was one of the thousands, which was methodically targeted during the 1984 Delhi riots.
Shonali Bose, who post beginning work on the film, also wrote a book by the same name, has with remarkable sensitivity created this film with an extremely poignant, but forgotten, background of the 1984 riots. The subject matter was subtly molded, without slipping into natural and obvious dramatics, and yet told a moving account. Konkana Sen Sharma's talents do unequivocal justice to her role. The sync sound and the camera seem to envelope you as the story unfolds across the elite and poor landscapes of Delhi.
Shonali met the small audience post the screening and talked about the difficulties in making the film and the censor board's audio cuts, which inadvertently increase the horror of the injustices.
What is encouraging and yet seems like a tiny, frail trickle is the struggle of artists like Shonali, who strive against the life sapping Indian system, to bring out an honest message. Her spirit is so uniquely Indian, which has immense patience to bear injustice, but which is raging under the surface, waiting, waiting, waiting for one triggering moment to let loose, hit back, and wash out all the grime which we have collected over the last few decades.
What India surely needs is a revolution; a revolution of social change, which will set right all the wrongs that we have willed and witnessed, a change which will create a society which is fair, free and just, a society of billion plus people, and not that of a few thousands living in the confines of expensive pigeon-holes, passing judgment on people, who are more indigenous than they will ever be.
Konkana Sen Sharma, who plays the main lead, Kaju, is a recent graduate from LA; coming to visit her cousin in Delhi, post 9/11. She visits the village where she was born, according to her adopted mother, played by Brinda Karat. The entire village migrated to Delhi after a severe malarial breakout.
But something doesn't seem right; Kaju has no memories of her time in the village. Coming back to city she explores the shanties with a friend of her cousin and stumbles across painful flashes of memory. Piecing together a shattered story she discovers her true origins to be a Sikh family, which was one of the thousands, which was methodically targeted during the 1984 Delhi riots.
Shonali Bose, who post beginning work on the film, also wrote a book by the same name, has with remarkable sensitivity created this film with an extremely poignant, but forgotten, background of the 1984 riots. The subject matter was subtly molded, without slipping into natural and obvious dramatics, and yet told a moving account. Konkana Sen Sharma's talents do unequivocal justice to her role. The sync sound and the camera seem to envelope you as the story unfolds across the elite and poor landscapes of Delhi.
Shonali met the small audience post the screening and talked about the difficulties in making the film and the censor board's audio cuts, which inadvertently increase the horror of the injustices.
What is encouraging and yet seems like a tiny, frail trickle is the struggle of artists like Shonali, who strive against the life sapping Indian system, to bring out an honest message. Her spirit is so uniquely Indian, which has immense patience to bear injustice, but which is raging under the surface, waiting, waiting, waiting for one triggering moment to let loose, hit back, and wash out all the grime which we have collected over the last few decades.
What India surely needs is a revolution; a revolution of social change, which will set right all the wrongs that we have willed and witnessed, a change which will create a society which is fair, free and just, a society of billion plus people, and not that of a few thousands living in the confines of expensive pigeon-holes, passing judgment on people, who are more indigenous than they will ever be.
posted by Ashok at 11:27 AM
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