MY CINEMAS

NOTE: This article written by me was first published in The Hindu, July 15, 2012.

Best Five

Motorcycle diaries (2004)

As a medical student and restless soul, Che Guevera, the mythic leftist youth icon traveled all along the South American continent in a rundown motorcycle with his biochemist friend Alberto Granado. The tour along the poverty stricken exploited populace of Latin America changed him forever and gave him the mission of his life. Che mixed whole-heartedly with lepers in the leper colony they served and refused to wear gloves while touching the lepers. In the end Che is a transformed character. This movie directed by Walter Salles has beautiful shots of landscape of South America with lilting music by Gustavo Santaollala. It is a must-see for all college students who have heart full of dreams, altruism and purity. The journey, the experiences can put one into introspection and transformation- such is the power of the movie.

There will be blood (2007)

Rise of a ruthless oil-magnate in California during the oil boom at the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century was documented in this movie. Beautifully enacted by Daniel Day Lewis, infuses life into the ruthlessness and avaricious character of the Daniel Plainview. The man utilizes innocence of a child to buy land and arm twists the local church to his monetary gain. At last he is friendless as he disowns his child and he kills the church priest.

Schindler’s list (1993)

Supposedly Spielberg’s best movie which won several Oscars with career-best performance by Liam Neeson as a benevolent German businessman who saved 1200 Jew’s lives during 2^nd world war. Shot in black and white it shows the horror of the Nazis and how Oskar Schindler ( Liam Neeson), a top ranking German businessman gives the Jews jobs in his factories and saves their lives. The scene where a young girl roaming aimlessly with a red rose and the last scene where the Jews presented him with a gold ring touched my heart. World renowned violinist Itzhak Perlman’s solo violin performance written and performed by him brought to life the trauma of gas chamber victims.

Meghe Dhaka Tara (1960)

This is a heart-rending story of an exploited daughter of a refugee family in Bengal. Supriya Chowdhury played the role of Nita, the daughter brilliantly. Everybody of that family rises up with her help forgetting her in the end. In a sanatorium in the end for treatment of TB, she cries from the bottom of the heart ‘Dada ami banchte chai’ ( Brother I want to live) when his brother narrates the story of well being of her family. A Rabindrasangeet ‘Je rat e mor duar guli bhanglo jhor e’ sung by Debabrata Biswas and Gita Ghatak is a brilliant rendition of a song displaying emotions of the central characters in a movie.

Apur Sansar (1959)

A Ray classic, the last part of Apu trilogy which brought Soumitra Chatterjee and Sharmila Tagore into films. A sweet tale of romance of newly weds Apu and Aparna disturbed by sudden death of Aparna (Sharmila). To forget his pains Apu (Soumitra) takes up a job in a coal mine in MP. One of the most memorable scenes in film history is when Apu throws away pages of his autobiographical novel which was supposed to be his dream-work. The floating pages drifting away in wind still bring lumps in my throat. Another poignant scene is at the end when Apu reclaims his son and walks to the new life.

Those five which almost made it

Central do Brasil (1998)

This movie is all about innocence. A disenchanted middle aged single lady, Dora develops a sweet attachment to an innocent 9 year old boy, Josue and goes on a journey of self-discovery to get the boy back to his father he never met. Dora earns by writing letter for illiterates in Rio Di Janeiro’s Central station which she never posts. She meets this boy whose mother accidentally dies in front of the station. She reluctantly takes care of the boy and tries to reunite him with his father who stays away in a small settlement in Brasil. The innocence in the storyline, in the sweet relationship between this lady and the boy tugs your heart-string. In the end she leaves this boy to get back to Rio and both are left alone with memories. This movie by Walter Salles won several awards in Berlin and Golden Globe.

City of God (2002)

City of god is my favorite any day. Reality does not escape from Rocket, the protagonist of City of God. He is a poor slum dog who wants to have a life free from crime and violence inherent in his surroundings. In Rio di Janeiro’s slum ‘City of God’, the natural course of a child’s life will be of drugs, crime and violence. Rocket’s gun-toting friends and siblings do the same thing. But Rocket wants to lead a clean life. Surprisingly, an ordinary camera comes to his rescue and becomes his passport to an honest world. He shoots photographs, not bullets, like gun-carrying friends and one day, his photograph of warring drug-lords of the slum makes front-page of a newspaper of which Rocket is a door-to-door distributor. Images of crimes from that slum are hard to come by; even police are averse to operate in that slum. Rocket knows these criminals from childhood and his proximity to these bad men is a boon. He can take inside images of this slum and those actually make Rocket a high-earning photographer. The escape from poverty through photography seems very much realistic to me. The man is rising above his destiny by hard work; not winning a jackpot through the hands of destiny. He is maintaining a core of honesty though surrounded by drug-dealers, petty snatchers etc. This act of reality attracted me the most. Fernando Mireilles directed this movie and it won 4 nominations in Academy awards though it won none in 2004. Despite that it is considered a world classic.

Nayak (1966)

This is another classic by Ray which portrays trials and tribulations of an amateur theater actor rising to stardom in films. Thought to be far ahead of its time, this movie shows the insecurities of a movie star, a hitherto unexplored theme in Indian films. Ray used the charisma of the matinee idol of Bengali cinema, Uttam Kumar. None other than Uttam Kumar seemed fit enough to portray the emotions of a film actor shown in several dream sequences and flashbacks while he goes to Delhi in a train. The probing questions of a lady journalist attract him towards her.

Fugitive Pieces (2007)

Recently after I saw ‘Fugitive Pieces’ (2007, directed by Jeremy Podeswa based on a eponymous novel by Canadian writer Anne Micheals) in IIT Bombay film club, a movie about Jacob Beer a holocaust survivor trying to coming to terms with his own loss I rediscovered the haunting melody of Beethoven….I realized why they say Beethoven is a timeless classic. Jacob’s sister used to play on piano ‘The Moonlight Sonata’ by Beethoven and Jacob remembers moonlight sonata from his past when they were a happy family of four until the Nazis hounded them in Poland, killed his parents in front of his own eyes and abducted his sister. Jacob survived miraculously with the kind help of a Greek archeologist. But the trauma that incident left behind is difficult to hide. He grows up in Canada, becomes a successful teacher and writer but never away from his past. He is consumed with the obsession of finding holocaust stories and writing them…..his wife Alexi deserts him once she gets to know from his diary how the shameless vitality of her is a distraction for Jacob’s endless pursuit of the past. In these moments and others when Jacob’s sister comes back in his dreams and memories I could identify with Jacob’s sense of loss.

Cairo time (2009)

I liked Cairo Time thoroughly. It is not like Turning 30 which I was suggested and got disappointed. 

Cairo Time essentially captures the love that never happened between two mature individuals 

disparate in their cultural settings. It's slow and long but passionate like smouldering ember. 

So don't see when you are particularly unhappy. But it's like coffee. Once you get into it you c

annot get out. At least I could not....The music, the photography, the moments of subtlety....s

imply touched me. Juliette, a mother of two comes from US to meet his UN official husband in 

Cairo. But her husband is away. In between she is taken care of by Tareq, a handsome Egyptian 

bachelor. Slowly she falls for Tareq over boat cruise on Nile, chess match in local café, a travel

 to the Pyramids and to Alexandria to attend Tareq’s old flame’s daughter’s marriage. 

They almost kiss once and despite that there are no scenes of physical intimacy; but when her 

husband returns after the long wait Juliette understands she has begun to miss Tareq. We get 

that hint by her uncontrollable sob  in her husband’s arm on the way to the Pyramids. A lovely 

ending for a love lost ! A sublime and haunting film on sensuousness embedded in a platonic 

relationship. This movie got an award in Toronto international film festival.