Cinema is a magical place where the unstated and the understated find face and voice. The 18th London Asian Film Festival, presented by ‘Tongues on Fire’, is a celebration of this form of art that has entertained, informed and educated us since decades. As part of the festival from 4th to 13th March, I watched ‘Chauranga’, a film inspired by real life events and it is disturbing, to say the least. Disturbing, because its message leaves you with a sense of shock and violation. The film was screened at Genesis Cinema, followed by a Q&A session with Tannishtha Chatterjee, Chauranga’s lead actress, with Daya Thussu, a professor of Global Media at the University of Westminster with an expertise on Indian soft power.
'Tongues on Fire' is a not-for-profit organisation whose goal is to provide a platform for independent film and arts with a link to South Asia. Chauranga (‘Of Four Colours’) is a story that umbrellas numerous mini-plots, forming a arrative depicting the archaic caste system in India. It is set in rural Bihar and revolves around Santu and his three-member family. Santu’s mother Dhaniya (Tannishtha) is a Dalit woman who is having a secret affair with the local upper caste absolutist strongman, Dhaval (Sanjay Suri). She does this in the hope of a better future for both her sons. Santu (Soham), the younger son, is a curious young fellow who gets infatuated with Dhaval’s daughter, unaware of its lethal consequences. The trouble with Chauranga is that it seems incomplete at several points. Too many mini-plots exist without a proper end. Veteran actors like
Dhritiman Chatterjee and Swatilekha Sengupta have been under-utilised and the film-critic-turned-writer-director Bikas Mishra could have explored an ethnically appropriate casting.
Despite the drawbacks there are some chilling scenes which stayed with me after the end– especially that of a Dalit boy being thrown by Dhaval’s goons into a well, and his (Dhaval’s) and family Purohit’s (Dhritiman) first reaction is to declare an urgent need for ‘purification’ of the well. Another scene – where the two young boys, unaware of their loving mother’s death, are beaten up by Dhaval, the sole witness to her eerie death. The creepy purohit, the ageing religious mother, the suffocated and neglected wife (Arpita), the innocent but protective older brother (Riddhi Sen) – all of the characters have tremendous potential, but none of them is followed from starting to end and that’s where Chauranga lost me. But the gripping acting prowess of Sen (Bajrangi) and Maitra (as little Santu) sure promise a bright future for Indian cinema.
