The Three Idiots Strike Back

3 Idiots (2009) an Indian film directed by Rajkumar Hirani started with the point of view of the narrator, Farhan Qureshi, telling a story of him and also a great friend he and Raju knew from university.  Farhan and Raju have been searching so hard for their best friend Rancho who has disappeared after the graduation. When they received clues of his whereabouts, they start a road trip to get their best buddy back. For this film, I am going to discuss about the aesthetic of Indian cinema by selecting a few examples from the film, '3 Idiots'. The aesthetics of Indian cinema are mostly the singing and dancing part, the Indian traditional costumes, the traditional ritual ceremony, the typical plot of rich meets poor, distinct dominance, and etc.

First, let’s talk about the performance art. In “3 Idiots”, there are scenes of songs and dancings, which are significant in Indian cinema, no matter what genre or story plot it is. According to David Courtney (2012), no Bollywood film would be complete without a song and dance between the hero and heroine. When Pia falls for Ranchoo, she imagines herself singing “Zoobie Doobie” and dancing in duet with Rancho. Meanwhile, having a group of dancers dancing the classical or folk dance with the main character(s) is also a signature part of Indian films.

Secondly, the Indian costumes are also the important part of Indian films. In India, even though western style of contemporary clothing like gowns, jeans, shirts tops can be seen in most Indian films, due to the influential of western culture, Indian film producers still maintain their traditional clothing for some scenes, and contemporary film like ‘3 Idiots’ is no exception. Indian traditional clothing is essential as different types of clothing represent the status and ethnicity of a person. Traditional clothing is also essential for different types of rituals, like wedding ceremony or funeral. For example, when the real Rancho is mourning the death of his father together with his family members and friends, they all wear pale white clothing during the funeral. Another example would be, when Pia is getting married, she wears traditional Indian wedding dress instead of western style of wedding gown.

Thirdly, the plot structure of Indian films is very much different from other foreign films that follow the Three Act Structure. Most films have their climax somewhere at the second half of Act two or Act three in Three Act Structure. But for Indian films, they divide the story into few parts, and each part with its own climax. So the whole structure of Indian film is like continuously up and down until the ending. For the story of ‘3 Idiots’, it is divided into few parts telling different stories of each characters and how the three best friends get into one trouble into another one, and they solve them one by one.

In nutshell, the whole film gave me a huge impact when it brings up the topic of suicide and critiques the Indian educational system and also common society thinking, as I did not expect to see these in Indian films. Instead of family drama, Indian action movie, typical rich meets poor romance plot, “3 Idiot” presents a story which is very much different from other Bollywood films by putting the “problems” on the screen. So, no more escapist genre of films that gives three hours of brightly colored fantasy to some people (Redlich. M, 2012), “3 Idiot” presents the “cruel” side of the reality on how people lost their enthusiasm, freedom or even their lives for something, just because of the social norms, educational system and also the economy.  For example, Farhan’s father insists Farhan to study Engineering while Raju as the eldest son in the family has to bear the responsibility of taking care of the family by study hard and earn a lot of money for the family, which make the whole film very close to reality.

Reference:

Ciecko, A.T. (2006) Contemporary Asian Cinema. New York: Berg, Oxford International Printing Ltd.

Courtney, D. (2012). Bollywood Dance. Retrieved August 19, 2014, from http://chandrakantha.com/articles/indian_music/nritya/bollywood.html

Goswami, N. (n.d.). The Empire Sings Back: Asthetics, Politics, and Postcolonial Whimsy. Retrieved August 20, 2014, from http://www.contempaesthetics.org/newvolume/pages/article.php?articleID=545

Lovgren, S. (2004). Bollywood: Indian Films Splice Bombay, Hollywood. Retrieved August 19, 2014, from http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/01/0121_040121_bollywoodfilms.html

Three-Act Narrative Structure(n.d.). Retrieved August 20, 2014, from http://www.indiana.edu/~audioweb/T206/three-act.html

The Love of a Sepet

The word “Sepet “in Malay language means “slit eyes” of the Chinese, a film title that contains a bit of stereotype, which I think the director trying to highlight this in the film.  Sepet, a multiculturalism film directed by Malaysian female director, Yasmin Ahmad in the year of 2004, which it is about a romance blooms between a Chinese boy and a Malay girl in Malaysia society. The aspects I would like to highlight are the issues of multiculturalism and hybridity, besides, there are also important issues highlighted by Yasmin Ahmad about the multiracial society in Malaysia, such as Stereotype, skin color and racial issues.

At the beginning of the film, multiculturalism is shown when Jason reads a Chinese translated poem written by a poet from India to his Nyonya mother. Later on, Jason uses Cantonese to communicate with his mother, while her replies him in Malay. Furthermore, the overall film uses variety of languages like English, Melay, Chinese, Cantonese and etc., as daily communication, which is a very common phenomenon in Malaysia society, because of Malaysian culture and education system.

As for the issue of hybridity, it can be seen from Jason’s family. Jason’s mother is a nyonya (Peranakan Chinese), a member of the community where Chinese practices Malay culture. She married to a pure Chinese man, but still remains the way she talks and dresses. Besides, the localization of foreign culture becomes significant in Malaysia due to the presence of global mass media (Ishak, 2011). For example, there are some scenes that shows Malaysians are exposed to other cultures like Orked’s maid Kak Yam listens to Thai songs and she watches Chinese drama with Orked’s mother. Even though they might not understand the language but they are still attract to it. From here, it metaphors how people still fall in love without knowing how it means.

Stereotype issues are found in the film where Chinese are said to have sepet eyes (slit eyes), Malays are lazy and etc. Take Jason (Ah Long) as another example, although he looks like a gangster, whom his job as a pirated DVDs seller also makes him like one, but he is actually not, he appreciates poetry and sometimes he writes poems. Another example would be Jason’s friend, Keong who seems like one of the gangsters but quite good in piano. From the examples given, most people judges someone based on the way they look or their job, which is very much stereotype. Sensitive issues like racial issue is also highlighted by Yasmin Ahmad when Kak Yam and Orked’s mother raise the issue of Malaysian education system giving different treats to different races. Other than that, Jason’s friends also mentioned that if Jason married to Orked, he can no longer consume pork and he needs to change his religion to Islam and also to go under bersunat(circumcision) which are very much concern and unacceptable by most Chinese.  Lastly, skin color issue is also highlighted in Sepet when Orked read about a book that is written by a black man who married a white woman that somehow “upgraded” his society level and also Orked’s friend, Lin who likes white man actors like Leonardo DiCaprio, which gives a feeling of white is always superior among all other races.

I love most of the films and advertisements that directed by Yasmin Ahmad. I love the way she produced local films and advertisements that contains rich local cultures which can be related to the audience and touches the heart of the audience. Even though most of her films highlighted some sensitive issues that might be unacceptable to some people, but she means no provoke. She just raises the topic and talks about it by using storytelling, which not much people able to do so.

Reference:

Blaetz, R. (2007) Women’s Experimental Cinema. United States: Duke University Press

Ciecko, A.T. ( 2006) Contemporary Asian Cinema. New York: Berg, Oxford International Printing Ltd.

Ishak, S (2011) Cultural Hybridity: Adapting and Filtering Popular Culture in Malaysia. Retrieved August 10, 2014 from source: http://jpmm.um.edu.my/filebank/articles/2953/01_JPMM%202011_No_1.pdf           

Lenos,M., & Ryan,M. (2012) An Introduction to Film Analysis. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc.

The Women in Shuhaimi Baba’s First Film

Shuhaimi Baba is one of the most famous female filmmakers in Malaysia who strives to give Malaysian cinema a more unique, artistic and commercial identity- an identity that would reflect Malaysia’s place with global modernity.(Levitin, 2003) And the film I am going to mention here is Selubung (1992), her first directed local film. Selubung is about a modern Malay young lady, Matsura who returns from studies abroad at Perth, Australia, feels bad for unable to help her friend E.J, who has chosen to follow the path of the religious extremist group led by Brother Musa. When she comes back to Malaysia, she joins a voluntary organization, “Rescaid” to help the children refugees from Palestine and there she meets Kamal, who is married but divorce to be Mastura. The nation-wide charity campaign that promoted by Matsura and the “Rescaid” team are quite successful, but tragedy strikes when a bomb planted by the terrorist explodes and caused Mastura falls in coma. When Matsura awake from coma, she still has the determination of protecting the unfortunate ones. As for the aspect of the film analysis, is to discuss the issue of women representation in film, and also focusing on Islam and modernity.    

First, let’s discuss about woman representation in the film. In Selubung, the leading roles are the female characters, not the male characters. Besides that, unlike female roles in other films, which are usually weak and follow the lead of the male lead, Matsura, the main character in Selubung shows another way round. She represents as modern, independent and highly educated woman during the 90s, who has the freedom to do things she likes and things she thinks that are right. While her best friend, E.J represents another type of female role that gives a contrast between her and Matsura. Although E.J and Matsura study aboard together, but her mindset is different from Matsura’s, she is much conservative and very religious kind of woman compare to Matsura. After E.J married to Brother Musa, she is like a traditional woman who follows and listens to her husband, which Matsura cannot stand of.

Secondly, according to Islamic rules, Muslim men are allowed to have more than one wife. But some modern Muslim women like Matsura refuse to take it. One of the example in Selubung is, even though Matsura is a Muslim, she does not like the decision of E.J marrying Brother Musa, as he has already has a wife, Hani. Another example would be, when Matsura finds out that Kamal actually married, she refuses to see him again until he divorced.   

Another thing in the film which is related to Islamic rule and modernity, is the issue of modern female representative in Malaysian Cinema do not wear tudung (head covering). This is might because of the influential of global modernity or to attract larger audience, since Malay cinema’s roots are more towards to entertainment rather than artistic expression. (Levitin, 2003)

In my opinion, the film Selubung is like an experimental film which the director tries to create film emotions by using different kind of techniques, which is kind of special. The overall film is sort of about feminist, Islamic and modernity in the 90s in Malaysia. And in Selubung, Shuhaimi Baba also shows her concern of the unfortunate Muslims from around the world.

Reference:

Blaetz, R. (2007) Women’s Experimental Cinema. United States: Duke University Press

Ciecko, A.T. ( 2006) Contemporary Asian Cinema. New York: Berg, Oxford International Printing Ltd.

Jarr, A., Malek, M.Z. (2005) Malaysian Films: The Beginning. Malaysia: Perbandanan Kemajuan Filem Nasional Malaysia (FINAS).

Lenos,M., & Ryan,M. (2012) An Introduction to Film Analysis. New York: The Continuum International Publishing Group Inc.

Levitin, J., Pleasis, J. & Raoul, V. (2003) Women Filmamkers: Refocussing. United Kingdom: UBC Press