|
FRIENDS
OF SOUTH ASIA
presents
Karvaan
a film by
Pankaj
Butalia
Saturday, March
29, 2003. 6 to
8.30 pm
Stanford University
Gates
Computer Science Building, Room 104
(directions)
This
event is open to all.. donations
are optional.
Pankaj Butalia's "Karvaan"
(1999) is a film on the India-Pakistan Partition, told from the perspective
of a man who has witnessed the deep-etched trauma that its victims
must bear. It is the story of two families who's fates are intertwined
with that of the Partition and its aftermath, and it derives its poignance
from the chilling proximity of the stories it tells.
"Karvaan" has been screened at various venues worldwide, including the Venice
Film Festival (1999), and the Rotterdam Film Festival (Feb 2000), to much
critical acclaim.
|
|
|
' Karvaan is a personal reconstruction of the vast migration of Hindus
and Muslims in 1947 and its consequences. The film is about the need to return
to places from the past, to come to terms with that, however painful that
can be. Pankaj Butalia wanted to tell this story to throw more light on today's
Indian-Pakistani question and to understand what role is played by reminiscences
in each of us. [Says] Pankaj Butalia: 'The complex stories we bear with us
in our soul reflect the suppressed patterns in society and vice versa" '
[... excerpted from the Rotterdam
Film Festival review].
|
Kitu Gidwani and Naseruddin Shah deliver powerful performances in the film,
which features script by Pankaj Butalia and Nilofer Kaul, and music by Susmit
Sen. For a detailed review, the
write-up at the South Asian Women's Forum (SAWF) website is a pretty
good one.
|
|
|
Pankaj Butalia (Ambala, India, 1950) taught
economics at the University of New Delhi for twenty years has been long committed
to the Indian film movement, taking part in numerous international festivals
and organising the section on documentaries at the Indian Film Festival from
1986 to 1988. He has made two documentaries -"When Hamlet came to Mizoram"
(1990) and "Moksha" (1993). Karvaan is his first feature film.
|
|
