j raman

Many movies hit the emotional chord - some movies make one think but this one strikes at the emotional level and makes one thinking for a long time on the complexity of human relations and emotions - the subject matter of complex human relations has been handled so deftly by Dr. Jabbar Patel and the whole cast has done complete justice to the subject. What i liked about the movie is - it is non-judgemental and also leaves one to think that not always can you say an action was right or wrong - there is an area beyond that which is very circumstantial and needs to be looked at with a different lens (beyond the usual bias of gender, class , caste etc.) To think that a movie was made almost 41 years back and covered an entire gamut of topics viz . a movie which seemingly has feminist leanings - actually goes way beyond that : * Women's career aspirations vis a vis familial responsibilities, * childcare responsibility, * lesbianism, * husband wife equation against the backdrop of wife's career aspirations, * independence in thought, * freedom to breakaway from usually accepted social mores * Emotional vaccum and saturation that develops in relations over a period of time * Attitude of the protectors of society towards their own responsibilty (thru' the managing committee members of the home ) is commendable - the red tapism and corruption prevalent in such insitutions then and now only goes on to show the decay that has set into not just our systems but our mindset - the attitude towards women's issues and crimes towards women have sadly not undergone too much change in these 41 years. * AND MOST IMPORTANTLY women are the torchbearers of patriarchy and how averse the population is to social change is also reflected very beautifully in this movie All these topics with toppings of a brilliant performance by Smita Patil & Girish Karnad and a superlative music score by Pt. Hridaynath Mangeshkar is a treat.