Tag: History

Thoughts on a few South Asian diaspora books

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Books I’ve Recently Read:

An Unrestored Woman by Shobha Rao

Synopsis: 1947: the Indian subcontinent is partitioned into two separate countries, India and Pakistan. And with one decree, countless lives are changed forever. An Unrestored Woman explores the fault lines in this mass displacement of humanity… In paired stories that hail from India and Pakistan to the United States, Italy, and England, we witness the ramifications of the violent uprooting of families, the price they pay over generations, and the uncanny relevance these stories have in our world today.

Don’t start this book if you’re in a bad (or down) mood; it’s not going to cheer you up. I liked a few of the stories, but some of them seemed too far-fetched or pandering to the exotic image of India. I don’t think men will enjoy this book much; the males in this collection are either terrible or impotent (as in unable to improve the lives of the women and girls in their lives). There is also no mention of the religious (mainly Hindu/Muslim) strife before (or after) Partition; this seemed odd to some of my book club. 

Streets of Darkness by A.A. Dhand

Synopsis: The sky over Bradford is heavy with foreboding. It always is. But this morning it has reason to be – this morning a body has been found. And it’s not just any body. Detective Harry Virdee should be at home with his wife. Impending fatherhood should be all he can think about but he’s been suspended from work just as the biggest case of the year lands on what would have been his desk. He can’t keep himself away. 

This (page-turner) is written by a pharmacist (he kept his day job) who grew up in Bradford, England. If you’re looking for literary, descriptive book re: desis in the UK, this isn’t the book for you; look up Nadeem Aslam and Kamila Shamsie instead. This is mystery w/ some desi flavor and interlinked characters who inhabit a city in decline (joblessness, drugs, religious strife, and white power). One of the best threads is the loving marriage between Harry (who was raised Sikh) and his wife (a nurse of Pakistani Muslim heritage). This book may be tough to find (for those in the US, as I learned from those in my book club); it’s available from UK sellers on Amazon. Dhand has already sold the rights to this book (and its sequel), so it will eventually be made into a TV show. 

Books I’m Currently Reading:

Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America by Vivek Bald 

Synopsis: Nineteenth-century Muslim peddlers arrived at Ellis Island, bags heavy with silks from their villages in Bengal. Demand for “Oriental goods” took these migrants on a curious path, from New Jersey’s boardwalks to the segregated South. Bald’s history reveals cross-racial affinities below the surface of early twentieth-century America.

This book is full of statistics, so it’s not a fast read. I’m in the middle of it now, and will keep on reading. It’s very educational, so I highly recommend it to anyone in the desi diaspora. I wanted to read it a long time ago, but didn’t get around to it. One of my acquaintances, an actor-turned-teacher, Alauddin Ullah, is featured in the book; his father came to East Harlem about 50 yrs ago from Chittagong (now a mid-sized city in Bangladesh).  

The Underground Girls of Kabul by Jenny Nordberg

Synopsis: In Afghanistan, a culture ruled almost entirely by men, the birth of a son is cause for celebration and the arrival of a daughter is often mourned as misfortune. A bacha posh (literally translated from Dari as “dressed up like a boy”) is a third kind of child–a girl temporarily raised as a boy and presented as such to the outside world. Jenny Nordberg, the reporter who broke the story of this phenomenon for the New York Times, constructs a powerful and moving account of those secretly living on the other side of a deeply segregated society where women have almost no rights and little freedom. 

I’ve only read a few chapters of this (nonfiction) book, but the topic is very interesting, so I will keep on reading. At the start of the story, Nordberg gets to know Azita, a female parliamentarian in her mid-30s, who has turned her fourth daughter into a boy (Mehran). 

The Dinner (2016) starring Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan, & Rebecca Hall

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[1] Nobody can accuse The Dinner of being unambitious, but I would like to accuse it of being an ambitious mess. 

[2] What happens when your are face to face with a clear moral dilemma? Can you bury your integrity in lies? Surely, such a deception will haunt you if you have a conscience. Self interest makes it harder to do the right thing, and this test will be faced by everyone at some point in their life.

[3] The enablers… are not helpful. They help perpetuate the problem via denial and/or self-interest. Unfortunately, this is how many families deal with mental illness: by winging it and not bothering to look up symptoms of abnormal and/or destructive behavior, and/or to consult with experts when these behaviors emerge.

-Excerpts from IMDB reviews

A former high school history teacher, Paul Lohman (Steve Coogan- an Englishman I’d only seen in Philomena) and his wife/cancer survivor, Claire (Laura Linney- one of my faves), meet at an exclusive restaurant w/ his older brother/congressman, Stan (Richard Gere), and his much younger wife, Kate (Rebecca Hall). Paul (who sees the negative side of life) obviously doesn’t want to be there; he has a very strained relationship w/ Stan and thinks that this food is extravagant. The plan is to discuss over dinner how to handle a crime committed by their teenage sons, Mike and Rick. We see in flashbacks the teens harassing a homeless woman, throwing garbage at her, then setting an ATM building on fire (w/ her inside). This was filmed, uploaded online (by Stan’s adopted black son- Beau), and made the local news. The boys have not been identified yet; the parents are very anxious about how this will affect their future.

Stan’s tireless assistant, Nina (Adepero Oduyo from 12 Years a Slave) is in the sitting room, holding his calls. Stan is a very busy man, running for governor and trying to pass a mental heath bill (partly b/c his own family has been affected by this issue). Kate is the one who truly knows Stan’s kids, as she has time for them (his ex-wife Barbara, played by Chloe Sevigny, has run away to India). We learn that the brothers’ mother was abusive, esp. to Paul. Stan was favored and had to be “the man of the house” (since their father was “checked out” emotionally). Paul lost his job after he lost his cool (in front of his class), cursing and insulting them. He was placed on meds, though stopped taking them (wanting to “feel like my old self”). Claire noticed that he was hiding the pills, yet didn’t say anything. 

This film has an interesting premise and tries to tackle big issues: morality, loyalty, mental illness, family dysfunction, and different fears (losing a spouse to illness, losing a child to jail, etc.) It’s not effectively put together, unfortunately. The sound design is bad (at times), the camera moves around (for no reason), and the editing is choppy. The characters turn out to be unlikable, yet not in an entertaining way. (A few viewers mentioned that the play Carnage tackles some of the same issues, but in a more interesting way.) The ending of the film is very abrupt- it’s as if the producers ran out of money! 

The author of the book “The Dinner” (Herman Koch) walked away from the European premiere of this film in early 2017. The Dutchman did not wish to stay for the after-party to talk to the director (Owen Moverman), cast members, or audience. Koch thought the scriptwriter had transferred his cynical story into a moral tale. He esp. disliked the movie’s reference to themes like American violence and the stigma of mental illness. A Dutch film came out in 2013, then an Italian one in 2014; both were well received and nominated for many awards.

I think it needed to be trimmed down. I loved the performances, esp. Rebecca Hall; I think she’s great in everything. I wasn’t bored. I was exasperated on some occasions. 

-Comments from Mark Kermode’s review (see below)

 

Christian Bale (& co-stars) discuss new movie: Hostiles

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Set in 1892, Hostiles tells the story of a legendary Army Captain (Christian Bale), who after stern resistance, reluctantly agrees to escort a dying Cheyenne war chief (Wes Studi) and his family back to tribal lands. Making the harrowing and perilous journey from Fort Berringer, an isolated Army outpost in New Mexico, to the grasslands of Montana, the former rivals encounter a young widow (Rosamund Pike), whose family was murdered on the plains. Together, they must join forces to overcome the punishing landscape, hostile Comanche and vicious outliers that they encounter along the way. -Synopsis for the film

This “revisionist” Western film is written/directed by Scott Cooper (Crazy Heart). The cast includes Academy-Award winner Bale and nominee- Pike (also a Brit). Veteran character actor  Studi (who is of Navajo heritage); you may know him as the imposing antagonist, Magua, on The Last of the Mohicans. The supporting cast includes Stephen Lang, Rory Cochrane, Ben Foster (Hell or High Water), Adam Beach (who is Canadian from the Ojibwa nation; co-starred on SVU), Q’orianka Kilcher (Bale’s co-star on The New World) and up-and-comer Timothee Chalamet (currently on big screens in Call Me By Your Name and Lady Bird). 

Official trailer for the movie:

 

Some of the cast and director talk re: the film at TIFF:

 

Christian Bale on CBS This Morning:

 

Bale, Rosamund Pike, & Wes Studi on BUILD (a live interview series in NYC):  

 

A relaxed, in-depth interview (shot in LA) w/ DP30: The Oral History of Hollywood:

The Rack (1956) starring Paul Newman

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Capt. Edward Hall, Jr. (Paul Newman)- the son of an Army colonel (Walter Pidgeon)- returns to the US (San Francisco) after 2 yrs in a Korean War prison camp. For 6 mos, he was isolated from the other prisoners and psychologically tortured. His younger brother (Paul) died in combat during this time. Ed is quickly charged w/ treason, assigned a JAG lawyer- Lt. Col Frank Wasnick (prolific character actor Edmond O’Brien)- and put on trial. Paul’s widow Aggie (Anne Francis) is empathetic and a willing ear for Ed, though his father is embarrassed (even refusing to come to court). He pleads “not guilty,” but had he reached a personal breaking point during his capture? 

This is a must-see if you like intelligent, sensitive, serious, and well-acted l films! The teleplay was written by Rod Serling (creator of the original Twilight Zone TV series). Paul Newman (then 30 y.o.) is able to keep the viewer’s attention in the quiet and intense moments; he slowly reveals the layers of his character. Newman creates terrific chemistry w/ his co-stars, most notably Pidgeon and Francis. The theme of the distant/unemotional father and son yearning for acceptance and love isn’t rare for Hollywood, though it’s handled very well here. When Ed leaves home and goes to stay in a hotel, a concerned Aggie goes to check on him. In a more obvious story, they may have become a romantic pair; here they become good friends.

The prosecution of a (previously decorated) war hero isn’t an easy thing to handle; it falls upon Maj. Sam Moulton (Wendell Corey), who isn’t too happy w/ the assignment. Lt. Col. Wasnick sees that Ed is full of self-pity, so has to boost his spirits and prep him to tell his story on the stand. O’Brien gets some of the best lines (during the courtroom scenes). Even the soldier who testifies against Ed, Capt. John Miller (character actor Lee Marvin), isn’t a one-note  character. It turns out that he also suffered tortured, though his was physical. Aggie confides her worries in a neighbor played by a very young (and pretty) Cloris Leachman; she later became an iconic character actor in comedy.

[1] This is fascinating drama… The ending is ambiguous and may well lead to a heated debate…
 
[2] …the theme is relevant today as it was when it was made.
 

[3] Paul Newman’s second film… [his acting] demonstrates that, even then, he was the truly finest screen performer around. But the very nature of his style has always placed him behind –or to the side of– more “bravura” actors of the time. Unlike Brando and Clift and Dean- he is much less self-centered; in other words he is a sharing actor. This puts the SCENE in focus more than the performance…

[4] I thought the acting was sincere and I was draw to this character that seemed to feel he lost his way by being human.
 
-Excerpts from IMBD reviews

Alias Grace (2017) starring Sarah Gadon & Anna Paquin

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Hollywood may still be a (dysfunctional) man’s world, BUT this Canadian 6 episode miniseries (streaming on Netflix) puts women in the forefront; they’re also behind the camera. The screenwriters are Sarah Polley (who started out as an actress, BUT garnered critical acclaim w/ her writing and directing) and Margaret Atwood (who wrote the historical novel upon which this series is based). Polley, who is also an executive producer, first tried to acquire the rights when the book came out in 1996. If you liked The Handmaid’s Tale (Hulu), check out Alias Grace; they share many common themes. I looked up the veteran director (Mary Harron); she was at the helm of American Psycho, as well as eps of two of my favorite shows (Homicide; Oz). The star of the series, Sarah Gadon, is a 30 y.o. actress who I’ve seen in a few films (A Royal Night Out, Maps to the Stars, and Belle). She is one of those women who can easily pass as a teen girl, if the role demands. And yes, ALL the women mentioned so far are Canadians!

The story focuses on a retelling of the events leading up to the (real-life) murders of Thomas Kinnear (Paul Gross from Due South and Slings and Arrows) and Nancy Montgomery (Oscar winner Anna Paquin). An Irish immigrant maid in Victorian era Toronto, Grace Marks (Gadon), is questioned many years after her conviction at the Kingston Penitentiary by a young psychoanalyst, Dr. Simon Jordan (Edward Holcroft). Grace (along with stable-hand James McDermott) was convicted of murder, but doubts surrounding her guilt remain. Dr. Jordan (who was created by Atwood for this series) was brought to town by a Spiritualist society, headed by Rev. Verrenger (famed director David Cronenberg). 

I started watching Alias Grace after an acquaintance posted about it on Facebook; she has written for TV herself. When some people watch period dramas, they’re looking for an escape (Downton Abbey is a popular example from PBS). However, Alias Grace is NOT all stiff upper lips, spotless clothing, and nice scenery; it has troubling (and sometimes bloody) scenes. This show is also providing  commentary on contemporary times; issues such as immigration, abortion, and harassment come up. 

[1] Sarah Gadon manages to simultaneously convey purity and malevolence with a single glance, and the dynamic between she and Dr. Jordan is laden with wonderful tension. 

[2] The main character, Grace, is a complex study in not only the human mind and its darker recesses, but also the power of the survival instinct in all of us. 

[3] Grace’s inner voice is strong and true. Also, she has no control over her life, but she is not broken. I often think that is the greatest sin of woman of her kind in the eyes of society.

[4] …the filmmakers here really paint a visceral picture of what life likely consisted of for women (and men) of that time period.

[5] The directing is precise and shows you what you need for the story. The horrific and painful parts of the story are such that it could not have been shown in such detail if it was adapted many years ago. What a perfect balance of beauty and horror.

–Excerpts from IMDB reviews