The Darjeeling Limited

If Moonrise Kingdom is quirky, Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited is quirkier: but Anderson's signature style is quirkiness. What many forget, or overlook, amazed or awed by the oddballs peopling his films, is Anderson's sensitivity to a place, an age or a character. In this story of three brothers, who may have come across as dysfunctional if not for the occasional leaps of goodness they also make, like the saving of children, the star is India: and Anderson is the only director I have seen till now who understands India. (A note is in due order here that I have not seen Louis Malle's documentaries; I love Louis Malle, and I think he might be another of that rare breed who understands India.) This film, made by an American, is a far cry from British films and TV around India, from the Marigold Hotels and Indian Summers. It does not patronise India, nor exoticises it: it rather jumps into the love-hate relationship that a non-Indian person finds him/herself in when coming to India, especially for the first time. And it does so with aplomb, through three characters whose craziness beats India's own craziness. It is no wonder that the three return from the airport, and continue on in their India and self-exploration: for where else there is such absolute liberty without encroaching on anarchy if not in India? And freedom does not lie in banners proclaiming liberté, égalité, fraternité; rather, when it is present, it is of no name, for why would a free society talk of freedom? It is the joy of life, of doing what you want, of sweet lime with snakes, and spirituality that does not divide itself into orders and yet implicates elaborate rituals of how to blow a peacock feather. It is the freedom for madness, when madness is routine.

Set to beautiful music, from various sources, especially the lovely theme from an evidently inspiring little-known Merchant-Ivory film Bombay Talkie, the film's strength lies in its cinematography and the three principal actors. It could have been a bit tighter, though: I personally didn't see the point of introducing physically the mother, but then, yes, it did bring them, especially Francis, closure, as did the death of the boy for Peter: closure from a want to belong to someone, father, mother, lover, child, world. In the end, they are happy to abandon their suitcases-sized father, and ready to embrace life, and India, and themselves as they are, and each other. For there is always another sweet lime, as Jack now knows: maybe he also achieves his closure for his ex-lover whom he hadn't been able to forget (Natalie Portman, in the short film Hotel Chevalier acting as prologue to the film, though I'd advise to watch it after the main film). Maybe he doesn't even need a sweet lime now. Their joie de vivre is now not so much strange, not so much out of place, not so much quirky.

En kärlekshistoria

En kärlekshistoria (A Love Story, better known as A Swedish Love Story) is a beautiful film; highly charged with the eroticism of innocence, without needing its actors to drop clothes, it is also a film that is sedimented with several layers of life lived: Pär's grandfather, who has lost all hope and is bitter; Annika's father who tried to make a meaning of life through money and career and failed miserably; loveless Eva and Annika's mother, women who need another to stand by them but have none; the protagonists Pär and Annika, who, though strong and innocent their love is now, one fears, will one day end up similarly; and, finally, the dog, the babies, the insensible ones, who are yet to journey. The film's title can mislead some: it is not a romantic film in the mould of Love Story: this long, slow film gives a lot of time to characters other than the lovers, to people and contexts around them, and that remark is valid throughout till the end of the film, not just for build-up of the romance. At the same time, the love story is the only whiff of fresh air in a decaying, crumbling society: there are generational tensions, and there is an evident class tension (urban/rural, middle-class/peasant, piano/motorcycle) that informs the film throughout. The film is more a keen observation of society: and the love that can bloom in spite of such harsh conditions, like a flower in a desert. This love is trapped in bubbles, in a world segmented into conflicts not created by Pär or Annika, and yet which affect them and will do so even more: but the two defy those bubbles, by creating a bubble of their own, in the form of their love for each other.

A Love Story is a grim film: it crucifies Pär and Annika, their innocence, for even though they are busy celebrating their love, trying to find an escape from the sordidness around them, it is inevitable, though not shown, that they and their love will be affected and influenced and changed. The bubble will be pierced one day. And hence it is a relief, a struggle to continue hoping, that that will not happen: that their love will continue to take root in each other's delight even after the film ends, as if Pär and Annika were real. And aren't they real? The beauty of Roy Andersson's film is that you relate to them, their love, for many of us have had or have dreamed of such a love, the very first full bloom and make-believe, which changed and scarred us for ever and yet remains a fond memory, which made us grow as a human and yet left a vulnerable child in us, thus preventing us from becoming stones or insensibles: maybe, even Annika's father loved thus once, though now so far, and maybe that's what helps him keep his sanity. Andersson's film is a celebration of our this very vulnerability: when we seek love and find it, and when we want it with all our heart and believe in it completely, the time standing still and eternal, when we can cry and not be ashamed. For when we love truly, without a past or future, we have the taste of eternity in this life.