Water - Movie Analysis

Deepa Mehta, who has been described as "Canada's most internationally renowned woman film-maker" (Levitin, An Introduction., p 273), was born in 1950 in Amritsar, a city on India's border with Pakistan. Like many other Hindu families, Mehta's parents had fled the newly created Pakistan at the time of Partition in 1947.

Deepa Mehta's film Water is set in 1938 in India. The film is situated in a historical moment when colonialism was still present, but being challenged by a young academic generation under the influence of Mahatma Ghandi. The film deals with controversial subjects, such as the social, economic, and cultural oppression of widows, prostitution, and the growing divisions between East (native Indians) and West (Colonial British). Within the film a contrast is also made between the wealthy 'Westernized' class, who fashion their lives around the British model, and the impoverished class, who subscribe to the extremely conservative religious life as taught in the 2000 year old Bhagvad Gita.

The film makes many connections to Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Narayan (John Abraham), a young upper-class academic, falls in love with Kalyani (Lisa Ray), a widow who has been forced into prostitution. Narayan discusses his love with his friend, Rabindra (Vinay Pathak), who states “stand beneath her balcony, but don't quote Romeo. People here don't know Shakespeare.” To which Narayan indignantly retorts, “you really are a brown Englishman.” This situates the two opposing political and cultural ideologies of the time: Rabindra, represents a putatively superior Western ideology, in which Shakespeare is viewed as the epitome of literary greatness, one that the lower classes could not possibly fathom, while Narayan, believes in freedom, Indian culture and the power of change. Narayan's point of view is compounded when he meets with Kalyani and confesses his love with quotes from an Indian poet, rather than Shakespeare. Mehta uses Shakespeare in a crucial scene in the film to establish this contrast between advocates of a colonial India and those Indians set to forge a post-colonial independent India.

There are films that entertain you and then there is a film like 'Water' by Deepa Mehta which moves you and shames you at once, for belonging to an ethos which conforms to the barabarities portrayed via the story of widows, perhaps sequestering,therefore further criminalised , ages ranging from eight to eighty. There maybe no answers, but should that hinder us from questioning? Especially in the darkened hall where you are spared looking at another Indian, in the eye. Should we hide these truths about India as we would our personal crimes?

In 2000 when the film had created a stir in the media and in Varanasi where it had caused a few Hindu fundamentalist groups to abort the shooting, one was confused as to whether our loyalties lay with our cultural lineage or freedom of expression which considered the same an anathema. The politicos had their sway and Deepa was forced to relent. She left the country ironically with a bound script, approved by the Ministry of Information and ...