A LETTERED SOUL: REFLECTIONS ON LITERATURE, CINEMA AND CULTURE .

OF PERIOD ESSENCES AND TIMELESS HUMAN RESOURCES.

A SUITABLE BOY

So often internationally helmed productions seem to ingratiate themselves when handling the diverse and universal panorama of an India-set story; this is almost as if the 'cultural aspect' itself is alien from the rest of the world and hence has to stand out without any deep probing of its unity with social structures everywhere/anywhere. A SUITABLE BOY, a screen adaptation of Vikram Seth's classic novel, finds the astute Mira Nair refusing to tie down her saga of newly independent India in knots or a singular perspective. Of course the 'marriage-obsessed' narrative vis a vis a nubile young girl's future prospects seems like a fairly conventional trap for a story made within the nation's backdrop. (So are end number of Austen adaptations then) But since I haven't read the novel yet, the BBC/NETFLIX six part mini-series turned out to be so much more. It is a wide-ranging tale traversing a volley of emotions and experiences. Each interpersonal relationship is memorably etched, whether filial or conjugal and by extension societal and especially romantic.

Ms. Nair, like the other great chronicler of multiple, transnational narratives Deepa Mehta, strings together socio-political unrest tantamount to nationalistic tendencies and religious strife, in the run-up to the first general election of independent India, with delicacy, befitting the contemporary flavours of its import within each episode capsule. But the secular and syncretic collaboration of hearts and generations lends it a timeless charm.

What always made it stand out for me was that it was shot in and around some of the best locations of my own culturally prominent city Lucknow(including some close to my own apartment). It employed not only its citizens in bit parts and supporting arcs but truly captured the diaphanous and enduring legacy of its time-honoured diversity, cutting across religions and class divides. Contingent with the novel's setting Bhrampur, Lucknow comes alive like none other, becoming the sum total of its classical and metropolitan heritage. I was so proud to have all the places I love and recognize visually put up on the big screen with such grace. Ditto the sequences involving the river shot in Maheshwar ( in the neighbouring state of Madhya Pradesh)