Accolade for family drama

THE WORLD'S oldest international film festival has conferred its top honour, the Golden Lion for Best Film, on ``Monsoon Wedding'', a production which is as Indian as they come. It may belong more to the so-called art cinema genre. But with a rumbustious Punjabi wedding drummed out with virile dance and vigorous music -not to forget the melodrama of a diasporic family congregation of relatives, flying in from far-flung spots across the world - it has enough masala for local relish, and sufficient magic for the foreign gaze tired of post-modern alienations. Particularly in warm blooded Catholic Italy, where family sentiments are cherished, and a wedding is occasion for clan gathering. Are you surprised then that jury President Nanni Moretti (winner of the Palme d'Or in Cannes for his superbly crafted ``The Son's Room''), bowled over by the family drama, should have called Nair a ``visionaria'' woman?

This film ``for India, my beloved India, my continuing inspiration,'' as Nair described it at the awards ceremony in Venice, showcases four days and nights preceding an arranged marriage, all light and cheer, ironically shadowed by the sudden discovery of the respected patriarch's propensities for child molestation. The bride has not ended her affair with her boss. Her parents have to come to terms with their own decades of aversion.

Though the press has called it a surprise win, this is not a wholly unexpected crown for Mira Nair - Indian born, Delhi grown, Harvard educated, with a first marriage to an American photographer, and now to a teacher of African Studies in Columbia University. From superstar Rajnikanth's Tamil hits becoming the rage in Japan, and Shekhar Kapur being invited to direct ``Elizabeth'', to Buddhadev Dasgupta's ``Uttara'' winning the prize in Venice last year for Best Direction, the 1990s have witnessed increasing global attention for Indian cinema. A. R. Rehman's music is used regularly in the sound track of western movies, from the zany ``Moulin Rouge'' to a grim Italian ``Denti''.

Nair has explained that she wanted to shoot this ``completely Delhi movie'' on digital video but settled for super 16mm stock as her crew found it impossible to capture the rainbow brilliance of an Indian wedding on the faster, cheaper mode. She opted for the hand held camera though, to retain the intimacy of a family assemblage, as also to imbue the pageant with a documentary quality. The plot accommodates several characters and relationships, including that of the cook with a cell phone who wants to turn event manager and romances with the maid.Like the controversy-ridden Deepa Mehta, Mira Nair has an open, international perspective, her finger on the global pulse. Though she indignantly spurns the idea of peddling oriental exotica to the West, her films, whether ``Salaam Bombay'', ``Mississippi Masala'' or ``Kama Sutra,'' have assembled ingredients guaranteed to trigger interest in the First World. The Daily Telegraph, London, attributed ``Monsoon Wedding''s award winning success to ``its crowd-pleasing ability to sweep an audience into the Punjabi culture of arranged marriages, steady unconsummated teenage lust, and the Bacchanalian Bollywood spirit.''

Other reports declared that since Jafar Panahi's ``Dayereh'' had won the top award in 2000, the festival jury did not want to give the same award to Iran again this year. Therefore ``Secret Ballots''(Babak Payami) had to be satisfied with the award for Best Direction, leaving ``Monsoon Wedding'' to win the highest prize in Venice.

Nair's future projects include a Hollywood production with a film based on Edith Wharton's novel ``A Mother's Recompense'' starring Susan Sarandon and Johnny Depp. (Remember Martin Scorsese's lyrical film from another Wharton novel ``Age of Innocence''?) But for many cineastes in this country, Mira Nair may remain more significant as a documentarist, a genre with which she began her career. In particular they remember her initial record of women strippers in Mumbai, for which she actually spent weeks with her protagonists in a seedy flat as preparation. Her more recent ``The Laughing Club of Mumbai'' was an enchanting effort, full of wit, vim, and a sensitive feel for every person in the frame.

At this moment of Nair's triumph, we recall that the first Indian to make a mark in Venice was Satyajit Ray, with the Cinema Nuouvo and Critics' Award in 1957, for ``Aparajito'', the second film in the Apu trilogy. Nair has been the first too, being the first woman to win the Venice Prize. But she has played the gender aspect down, echoing the Bhagavad Gita precept, ``I never think of the fruits of my action. I trust what I am doing and let it go''.

It was left to her script writer Sabrina Dhawan to point out the reason for the film's appeal, particularly to a Western audience: ``I do see stability in India's family bonds. We don't have the despair that so many cultures face.''We are left with an interesting question: in ``Monsoon Wedding'' do we see the triumph of content over form?

GOWRI RAMNARAYAN

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Entertainment
Previous : Film Review: Nayak
Next     : Tale of family bond