Crawlers of Cinema

People keep saying “I hope you had a good summer” but it’s not over yet!! Also I live downtown so I barely see any hints of colour (downtown trees are the last to change colour, a friend told me recently).

Last night I went to see my first film festival movie this year – The World is Family by director Anand Patwardhan. He was here in town from Mumbai to introduce the film and do a Q&A after. It was a touching film featuring raw footage of his parents’ later years, and their connection to Gandhi and the freedom fighters of India. When asked what message he hoped the audience would glean from the film, he said, “The India of today is the opposite of what the freedom fighters were fighting for.” It is so true. Personally I always go back to the way that women and girls are treated, because when there is no harmony in the family unit, there can be no harmony in the world. In the film there is a scene when he interviews a boy and asks him how the fighting started in his village. “It was the Muslims that started it,” the boy (who is Hindu) says. “And what if you were Muslim, would you still say the same thing?” The boy realizes his bias and smiles shyly.

Anand said that children are so easy to talk to because the poison has not infiltrated them yet. Oh all the hope of humanity lies in these adorable and inquisitive minds that are not afraid to speak the questions in their hearts. Innocent questions like, “Why are they still fighting?” Why indeed.

Anand’s father reminded me of my grandfather (Dada) with his sharp wit, cute smile, intelligence, and adoring affection for his wife. Anand’s mother was a renowned pottery maker, a passion that defined her life and filled her with gratitude.

This week we’re going to see the movie Ru, based on Kim Thuy’s novel, the story of a family that flees Vietnam in the 70’s, ends up in a refugee camp in Malaysia, and then lands in Quebec.

Some people in the theatre had already watched 5 festival films this week… the interviewer referred to them as soldiers of cinema. I’d say we’re more at the crawling phase.

I always look forward to September in Toronto because of the Film Festival, International Festival of Authors, and Nuit Blanche. This month there is also the Just for Laughs festival and a jazz festival in Kensington market! I’m going to the Rumi exhibit at the Aga Khan museum this weekend too. Which of course reminds me of a poem, about never giving up no matter how many times you get it wrong:

Come, come, whoever you are.
Wanderer, worshipper, lover of leaving.
It doesn’t matter.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.

Come, even if you have broken your vow
a thousand times.
Come, yet again, come, come.

Rumi