On watching Il Postino

Barely recovering from watching Il Postino... what a tribute to poets and poetry...
It will take time for me to recover from this film enough to write about it.

THE STORY

For those who have not seen the film... The Poet Pablo Neruda is in exile and takes off from his native country, Chile, to stay in an italian island until the ban on his entry is lifted. Most of the people in the island are illiterate and so a postman is needed to serve the mailing needs of just the poet and his wife. The villagers, especially the postman and the post master are excited that so famous a man should be staying in their village.

Slowly a relationship develops between the postman and the poet. Infected by the poet's love for imagery, the postman starts writing poetry. He befriends the poet, who also helps him in his budding romance with the village belle. Interspersed with the story of their romance is that of a right-wing politician who is trying to win over the villagers from their affinity for the communists.

The postman gets married and Neruda is his best man. Soon, exile over, Neruda has to go back to his hometown and a year passes by. There is a demonstration and the postman is killed in the firing on the communists. Some years later, Neruda visits the village hoping to meet his old friends, but the postman is no more. He has to make do with meeting his wife and child.

The film ends with Neruda walking on the shore of the beach, remembering the days he spent with his friend and a poem of his flashes on the screen. The poem is about How Poetry came to him...It could be written by the postman himself...



SOME COMMENTS

Somewhere deep the postman touches you with his poetry and idealistic ambitions. Still I can't forgive the director for killing off the postman at the end. Or is it that poetry can never be born without a death happening inside you at the very least.

Pablo Neruda's poem appearing at the end of the story makes you feel that like in Borges' story, where the writer meets himself from a time in the future - his future self, here too, the postman was Neruda too, and the older self came to him to waken him to poetry.... Well. it must be good to have your future self come in and tell you to buck up or else you will miss the nobel prize!

Well that was a happy way to see the death of the postman, but the line on the video cover still beats me - it says "Romantic Comedy" ... WTH????

films or music or home!

The chennai international film festival just concluded. A plethora of films from various countries spread out over two weeks. Vying with this was the Chennai music festival for which I was commissioned to write a few pieces. I would have managed this and the usual work demands but most worryingly, mother was unwell.

Something that brings things into sharp focus is illness. What is more important? what are festivals of music and films for? What is art? and lastly, why do you watch films, read, hear music????

Still, some memorable films in the festival and I'll write about them here soon...

Gollapudi Srinivas Awards - A Musical Treat

The day - 12 August 2009, Memorable for being Kamal Haasan's fiftieth year in Cinema since Kala-th-thur Kannama.

Dr KJ Jesudas and group's concert at Kamarajar Arangam was a lovely beginning to the evening, jointly anchored by Uma PAdmanabhan and Shruthi Kamal Haasan.

As Uma Padmanabhan concluded after the concert- it made everyone forget the pains of today's living , even the swine flu scare and gave peace to everyone for the duration of an hour-and-a-half.

Dr Jesudas sang Krishna Nee Begane Baro in his own unique style - full of expressive emphasis on the meaning and really brought the krithi alive as no one else has until now.

The films by Rajeev Menon on Gollapudi Srinivas and the award winners were extremely moving to watch.

The audience warmed to the show as their favourite film personality from Bollywood - the glamourous and talented Ms Rekha walked up to the dais in her timeless beauty and grace, clad in a off-white Kancheepuram silk saree.

Samudirakkani's Nadodigal - Part II

It is a never ending debate whether personal choice must bow to societal compulsions.. I do not think Nadodigal addresses this question at all. It is about quite another issue - of there being no freedom without responsibility...

In a chat show on TV Suhasini also quizzed the director about the last scene when the girl is shown as being slapped. That is an unfortunate pattern that films in TN have got into. Film makers seem to think that it is perfectly justified to show such a scene if the director believed that particular character would do it... They don't seem to get the message that such a shameless acceptance of violence against women is just not the end of their own learning process...

Now how does one communicate this?

Nadodigal is gonna be remade in Bollywood - a land of no Rajnikanth no Vijaykanth and no sense-of-humour... How is It (possible)?

Nadodigal - by Samudirakkani

Yesterday we went for a film - my mother, Peer and I. This was Naadodigal, a film that we were much tempted to see because it promised a totally fresh viewpoint of cinematic life.. here are some thoughts on the same...

My first reaction was to think that this is a very superficial story - but later, on thinking deeper, I felt that there is a point - that love and marriage in a society like ours means more of responsibility and commitment than the romantic fabulous individualistic sexual saga that it's made out to be. It's true that often the risk of bringing together two people from different strata is run not only by themselves but by the entire group of friends and well-wishers.

The story is this - Three friends, Karuna, Pandiyan and Chandran, are just beginning their journey as educated youth in search of careers and experience. Karuna and his cousin Nallal are in love and her father has agreed to get them married on condition that Karuna gets a job in the TN state public service. He is all into that. His sister, Pavithra, and Chandran are attracted to each other and the third friend, Pandian is their loyal and trusted buddy in all exploits.

Meantime, one of Karuna's friends, comes to him, seeking support in his desire to marry a girl against the wishes of either set of parents. Karuna is an idealistic youth full of fervour and rebellion. He ropes in all his friends and very efficiently achieves the formidable feat of rescuing these two members from the influences of their powerful elders... That is the first half of the story.. a complete entertainer.

The second half almost deconstructs the whole thing... While the newlyweds spend the first month of their married life having fun at a beach resort, the brunt of their rebellion is borne by the people who risked their lives to help them suceed. Karuna misses his Government Service Interview, moreover the parents carry out legal proceedings against the three friends, which puts a permanent blackmark on his file; Chandran loses a part of a limb and Pandyan suffers a blow which permanently impairs his hearing! To add to the repercussions, Karuna's uncle blackmails his daughter Nallamma into marrying a different boy - just, it seems, to spite Karuna and his family.

The story comes to an anticlimax when the couple realise that they are more interested in the good life than one of togetherness and struggle so they - SPLIT!!!! All their efforts were for nothing!!!! Now comes the twist - which u can see in the film!