FILM REVIEW supposedly gives them an edge over other ordinary riff-raff also trying to The Electric Moon emulate the white sahibs. The two brothers and the sister by be­long to an impoverished erstwhile Madhu Kishwar royal family, now reduced to selling themselves, their past and their privacy To an audience addicted to soppy, demeaning interaction between the to the foreigners who have come to sentimental, “permanently - and - people of the arrogantly dominant India in search of the Oriental mystique thor­oughly - good - guys versus West and the grovelling Third World. — tigers, turbans, maharajas, snake perma­nently - and- irredeemably - bad The film does not have much of a charmers and the like and ‘an-easy-to- - guys” format of Indian cinema, this is conventional “story” — but is an digest dose of India’s poverty.’ What bound to present itself as a disturbing un­folding of characters through a was once probably the erstwhile film. At the Bangalore film festival the series of encounters. In the forests of maharaja’s es•tate, is now a “national director Pradip Krishen and script- Central India there is an expensive park”—in other words — property writer Arundhati Roy were flooded jungle lodge called the Machan which forcibly taken over by the Government with a barrage of hostile questions: caters exclu­sively to foreign tourists. and “managed” in characteristic “How dare you present Indians in such Desi elite are simply not allowed even rapacious and red tapist style by a bad light?”, “It will harm the national if they are willing to pay as much as sarkari babus. image,” and so on. This is a film that the foreigners. The Machan is run by Bubbles, Socks and Ranveer run flatters no one — in fact it is a the impeccably westernised Raja Rau the Machan, along the lines of a camp thoroughly irreverent film. There are Bikram Singh, his sister Sukanya and at the time of the Raj. Even the servants no heroes and no villains their younger brother Ranveer Singh, are made to appear as classic oriental — only ordinary human beings played by Gerson D’Cunha, Leela creatures who play well-rehearsed with all their vanities, failings and petty Naidu and Roshan Seth respectively. roles in order to help fleece the foreign dishon­esties allowed a full play, as in Even their pet names, Bubbles for tourists through stage-managed tricks. real life. Compared to their first film made Bikram Singh, Socks for Sukanya and But the star tourist attraction is by Roy and Krishen together, In Which Chris and Eric for Ranveer’s sons Bubbles himself — as an oriental Annie Gives Them Those Ones, which Akshay and Aditya are hilariously apt Maharaja. In actual fact he has more in seemed to me rather teenagerish in its as symbols of an attempt of our brown common with quirky British aristocrats self righteousness, this film has both a sahibs to be more British than the after whom large sections of the complex and a challenging vision. This British, while at the same time being dispos­sessed Indian royalty began to film is like a breath of fresh air even for, unable to give up altogether their model themselves. Bubbles submits to avant garde alternative cinema which, original identity as rep­resented in their the charade he has devised, even despite its attempts to be realistic, given names serving as mementos of though he wants to maintain the sel­dom rises above goody goodism their pedigreed up­bringing which pretence that he and his family are of the Aakrosh-Nishant syndrome that above the “vulgar” riff-raff. He even neatly divides the world between the evil, ex­ploiting rich and the angelic, exploited poor. Arundhati and Pradip Krishen have been courageous enough to show without embarassment that poverty is not a conducive ground for breeding angelic creatures, that relations between the dominant and dominated inevitably demean both. And the interaction be­tween the two does not usually allow for the heroism and dignity which radicals have often attributed to the poor. It is a no-holds- barred description of the mutually Bubbles receives a group of American tourists 32 MANUSHI learns to play the part of a male stud to scarred by the accident. The family the Punjabi English of Veekay, Madhya some of the western women who come makes him rou­tinely exhibit his scars Pradeshi bureaucratese of Goswami to Machan and ex­pect a brief sexual while narrating the gory tale of how and the inimitable Chrischun English affair with the real Maharaja thrown in his father’s body was mangled by the of Johnston among many oth­ers. Here as part of the tourist package deal. tiger in an attempt to save him. is a sample from Johnston’s account In tune with its anti-hero tenor, the And when the same Johnston of his encounter with the tiger, “Tiger film does not use the supposedly minor resigns from his job as bearer, bite, Madam. Before I became characters as mere props. In fact, each declaring pompously to his Chrischun. In that time I am only 13 one of the characters is delin­eated impoverished “royal” employers that years. My father was woodcut­ting in with unusual care for detail and each he has decided to “freelance”, one jungle, when one maneater tiger one is allowed to have a life of his or doesn’t know whether it’s a slap on came—His eyes like Devil eyes, yellow her own. The audi­ence is not allowed the face of his employers for having yellow — And he’s catch me here with to identify with any of the characters exploited his story, knowing fully well his mouth——I am shouted but he’s — we are made to laugh at pullt me away—— I can smell them all. Yet most of them his inside mouth. Very very have a sort of tragic dignity bad smell, Madam like that— to them. For instance, Boltoo, — rotten meat you know?— the tracker, shows his (Johnston turns around and debasement as part of the lifts up his shirt to reveal a fraudu­lent tourist package deep gouge running down his even in his twisted up body back and continues his spiel.) movement. He is a petty thief, Sixty five estetches..Then my steals firewood as well as cold father came to look me. Then drinks meant for the guests. the maneater left me and killed And he is suitably servile. Yet my father, madam—Then I he manages to lend a sort of become Chrischun and desperate dignity to his role Carpet Sahib send me to in brief memorable scenes Mission school — Now I am where he manages to be one residing here for bearer. You up on those for whom he is Leela Naidu as Socks can see,” and passes on to no more than a “facility” they have paid that their exhibiting his scars is one of them a yel­lowed press for. the Third World grotesqueries that has clipping wrapped in a polythene packet Gaj Singh, Boltoo and Johnston are instant tourist appeal — or amounts — as proof of the veracity of his story. trained to behave like puppets. One of to spitting on his own face for having The mutual interaction of these the most tragically hilarious scenes is acquired sufficient confidence in various language types is as hilarious when over breakfast the guests are selling his own scars all on his own. as the reactions of the tourists who en­tertained to a gory account of the The film is made in English with a touch are being defrauded and ridiculed by tiger coming for his kill: Boltoo’s of Hindi thrown in. But it is re­markable those whom they consider no more “rehearsal” has made his whole the way scriptwriter Roy makes every than hirelings. While the Indians who account sound a little stilted and kind of English appear mirthful by no try to fleece the gullible western melodramatic. Sukanya and Ranveer more than making each type speak tourists are ruthlessly ridiculed, the obligingly translate his narrative but typically. There is the English English latter are not spared either for their have to remind him on the side, of Phoebe and her husband lan which pursuit of the stagemanaged, sterilised “Boltoo, zyada banavati lag raha hai, stays immaculate even while they are slice of real India and their distaste at thodakumkaro.”(Bo\too, it sounds hurling abuses at each other. There is seeing “too much plastic” around. too artificial. Tone it down a little). This American English, French Engh’sh and They like the mud huts, but not to live is followed by a scathing critique of all the English of brown sahibs, Ranveer, in — only for taking pictures. They those who sell India’s misery and scars Socks and Bikram Singh, whose expect every one of their whims to be — done in a memorable scene with faithful copy of the Queen’s English indulged in since they are paying for Johnston giving a well rehearsed surprises even the British. But even the “facilities” which include, in the narra­tion of how he survived the within Indian Engh’sh, Arundhati Roy view of some of them, sexual services attack of a maneating tiger when he is able to bring out char­acteristic on demand by whoever they fancy. was 13, though he was left gruesomely regional and class nuances. There is Everything, in their view, ought to be NUMBER 72 33 available for a fee and the promise of a A hard hitting scene : Ranveer (Roshan Seth) at the police station for the handsome tip.