Like it or not, we have all got our own idea of what India is. Country of chaos, spices, creativity, speed and rapid growth, India’s place in the global scheme of things should not go overlooked. Whilst the country is associated most often with fantasy and journeying, it is equally representative of comfort, home life and human desires and aspirations. Although popular culture continues to tell us otherwise, we should not assume that India is a place entirely of ‘otherness’, in which Westerners can come in order to find themselves in the country’s magic. The place is utterly multifaceted and experiencing true India is a very changeable thing indeed.
Of course, many of us have only experienced the country through the movies, picking up tidbits here and there about what India truly is. Whilst no one portrait can said to be truly encompassing, there are a number of works which can begin to teach us about life in the East. Just as easily, of course, we can be mislead, viewing the country through the eyes of the hungry film industry and equating it with something altogether different. Cinema has led and misled us over the years and whilst it is often clear what we should believe, sometimes fact becomes entangled with fiction and our beliefs become warped. Looking at the cinema about India from a comprehensive viewpoint, then, is essential in guiding our understanding of the place. It’s not always the West which gets it wrong, either; sometimes, the eyes of an outsider can be just as informative.
Perhaps the most famous of all films about India is Satyajit Ray’s The Apu Trilogy. Split into three works, the trilogy follows the life of one young boy, Apu, as he grows up in India. Focusing on his young life, adolescent years and journey into fatherhood, The Apu Trilogy is a comprehensive look at what it meant to be an Indian man in the early 20th century. The trilogy works so well precisely because it is presented as a family drama; whilst India is undoubtedly an important figure in the films, it is only ever present as a passive force. Ray uses the place as a means to develop his characters, or to say things for them without literally coming out with it. India stands in for loss, absence, love, relationships and so much more. Apu’s journey through the country mimics his journey through life and India is the only constant, nurturing presence.
More recently, India has been portrayed in Ritesh Batra’s drama The Lunchbox. Following the famous lunch box delivery service in India, the film follows one particular meal who is delivered to the wrong man. After discovering the box’s delicious contents, irritable widower Saajan writes a note of thanks to the woman responsible for making it. Soon, a pen pal relationship develops and the two end up learning invaluable lessons about the meaning of relationships. The Lunchbox works in a similar way to The Apu Trilogy; focusing on the country from a native perspective, it doesn’t feel the need to glamourise or exoticise the country. Instead, India is presented as a ‘normal’ place in which ‘normal’ relationships are formed and broken apart. The Lunchbox shows us how events in India can mirror those close to our own lives, how the East is not as far away as we might have thought.
Of course, it’s not all gentle drama in India and as far as many major Hollywood films are concerned, the country is a place of action and event. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom involves the eponymous character setting forth on yet another mission, this time to retrieve a precious gem and several kidnapped Indian boys. Action inevitably ensues. Whilst the film was created with clear entertainment purposes in mind, it presents a biased portrait of the country. India in the film is a place unable to defend itself; it is down to the mysterious outsider to rescue its people from peril. Although the film is very much of a certain genre, its presentation of India is problematic. Focusing on it as passive, other and exotic, the film does not enlighten its audience on the real potentials of the country.
Focusing on India again from a Western perspective is Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited. In the film, three brothers journey across the country in attempts to locate their wandering mother who has transplanted herself somewhere in the Himalayas. Whilst the film is very much about India, it focuses on how the country serves a purpose to the family at the narrative centre, not about how India really is. The brothers use the country’s exoticism to act out a sort of ritual farewell to their recently deceased father. Although there is some interaction with the locals, it is consistently done as a way to fuel the brothers’ own journey. India in the film enables the brothers to find themselves and grow closer. Whilst the country is very much present, it is only to serve the needs of the characters.
Finally, The Jungle Book. The first time the majority of us experienced India through film, The Jungle Book was, for me at least, entirely responsible for how I thought about the country. Focusing very much away from civilisation, the film portrayed the village’s culture as inherently other; the native Indians were outsiders in their own country. Instead, animals ruled the land and it was the humans that were taking over their space. Whilst the film is incredibly beautiful and sensitive, it creates a rift between natural India and the India formed by humans. The animals avoid the human village not only for their safety but because it represents a life completely adrift from their own. Similarly, the humans don’t cross into the natural environment in the knowledge that it is not a place in which they belong. India belongs to the wild; its inhabitants can only hope to borrow a part of its land to use for a time.