I must have watched this movie around a dozen times now. That is not unusual with me. For some years now I have realized I have obsessive tendencies.
Lakshmi thinks that I am smitten with Isha Talwar's looks. I suspect that there may be some truth in it. She is the totally fictional ideal of a girl that is impossible not to fall in love with. She has it all: Looks, musical and literary talent in plenty, a very pleasing nature, yet understated and lineage.
Above all she has the ability to fall in love, seemingly recklessly. But when you reflect more it turns out that she has the instinct of an intelligent and well-educated woman who can smell the genuineness of a man's affection for her.
As I do very often when I like a movie or story a lot I tend to dig into its backdrop and the characters. That is when and how the story comes alive to me. In an earlier post I noted how our understanding of the western classics will never be the same as that of a westerner; because we do not live the life of a westerner, we do not speak his language.
My digging into the backdrop for this movie tells me how little I know of the social milieu in which its story is set. The life of a college student in Thalassery and of the Hindu-Muslim social equations there make the context so different in a way that I do not know it well enough to be able to get underneath the skin of the dramatis personae.
Being able to fully appreciate a story requires that ability - to see the world through the eyes of that character. And the hallmark of a truly great writer lies in her ability to effectively transport you to that world of make believe.
The movie does that part very well. It presents a good portrait of each of the characters, even that of Ayesha's father whose appearance is so short that it could pass off for a cameo role. So that is the trick: You know enough about the character to see him or her in the context of that narrative. I call that economy of narration.
And that is what makes me go back to the movie. Every time I view it I get to notice a thing or two about the context that escaped my attention on the previous occasions.
I dug up on Thalassery as I watched the movie. And I realized how little I know about the state I hail from.
Thalassery is a town with a deep sense of history. A history that has not been as widely appreciated as it ought to have been. It is ironic that towns like Thalassery do not receive a fraction of the attention that the narrative on the East India Company and Siraj ud Dowla receive, for example, from historians studying the advent of Europeans in India.
I wish I could spend a few days there, wander through the corridors of the college where the romance between Vinod and Ayesha blossomed. I wish I could feel the breeze on Muzhappilangad beach where the French and the Portuguese landed many centuries ago. I would like to go and see those places where Pazhassi Raja plotted his military moves.
Needless to state it will bring back painful memories of another coastal town in Malabar that I fell in love with. I need to brace myself for that.
Nanni...Namaskaaram...
Lakshmi thinks that I am smitten with Isha Talwar's looks. I suspect that there may be some truth in it. She is the totally fictional ideal of a girl that is impossible not to fall in love with. She has it all: Looks, musical and literary talent in plenty, a very pleasing nature, yet understated and lineage.
Above all she has the ability to fall in love, seemingly recklessly. But when you reflect more it turns out that she has the instinct of an intelligent and well-educated woman who can smell the genuineness of a man's affection for her.
As I do very often when I like a movie or story a lot I tend to dig into its backdrop and the characters. That is when and how the story comes alive to me. In an earlier post I noted how our understanding of the western classics will never be the same as that of a westerner; because we do not live the life of a westerner, we do not speak his language.
My digging into the backdrop for this movie tells me how little I know of the social milieu in which its story is set. The life of a college student in Thalassery and of the Hindu-Muslim social equations there make the context so different in a way that I do not know it well enough to be able to get underneath the skin of the dramatis personae.
Being able to fully appreciate a story requires that ability - to see the world through the eyes of that character. And the hallmark of a truly great writer lies in her ability to effectively transport you to that world of make believe.
The movie does that part very well. It presents a good portrait of each of the characters, even that of Ayesha's father whose appearance is so short that it could pass off for a cameo role. So that is the trick: You know enough about the character to see him or her in the context of that narrative. I call that economy of narration.
And that is what makes me go back to the movie. Every time I view it I get to notice a thing or two about the context that escaped my attention on the previous occasions.
I dug up on Thalassery as I watched the movie. And I realized how little I know about the state I hail from.
Thalassery is a town with a deep sense of history. A history that has not been as widely appreciated as it ought to have been. It is ironic that towns like Thalassery do not receive a fraction of the attention that the narrative on the East India Company and Siraj ud Dowla receive, for example, from historians studying the advent of Europeans in India.
I wish I could spend a few days there, wander through the corridors of the college where the romance between Vinod and Ayesha blossomed. I wish I could feel the breeze on Muzhappilangad beach where the French and the Portuguese landed many centuries ago. I would like to go and see those places where Pazhassi Raja plotted his military moves.
Needless to state it will bring back painful memories of another coastal town in Malabar that I fell in love with. I need to brace myself for that.
Nanni...Namaskaaram...
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