{"id":9473,"date":"2024-12-25T08:45:09","date_gmt":"2024-12-25T03:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/?p=9473"},"modified":"2024-12-25T08:45:09","modified_gmt":"2024-12-25T03:15:09","slug":"ankur-1973-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/ankur-1973-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Ankur (1973): The Seed of Revolt Against Rural Power Dynamics"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Shyam

Shyam Benegal (Pic: Wikipedia)<\/p><\/div>\n

When the Indian New Wave started off in 1969, it was a feeble stream. It coincided with Hindi cinema\u2019s first megastar Rajesh Khanna\u2019s meteoric rise. Four years hence, Rajesh Khanna\u2019s slump was punctuated with the emergence of Amitabh Bachchan. The mantle shifted in mainstream films, from romantic genre to a more violent one. Bachchan perfected the average cine-goer\u2019s wish of an angry young man image who can tear away injustices almost singlehandedly. The glowing flames of Naxalite movement has started raging through the country, if not entirely in action but as news. An alternate cinematic vision, hence, was a need of the time, even in the mainstream space.<\/p>\n

People were angry. They wanted their anger being represented bare, not cajoled by illusory love. It was in this juncture that Shyam Benegal\u2019s films gave focus to the angst of the intellectual audience, who were not able to satiate their fury in mainstream\u2019s violent methods. But Benegal\u2019s influence was not so temporal. Rather, it was rooted in the Telengana peasant insurrection of the mid-1940s when he was growing up in Hyderabad. Not only in Ankur<\/em> (The Seedling), but also in his next two films Nishant<\/em> (Night\u2019s End, 1975) and Manthan<\/em> (The Churning, 1976) the unmistaken resurrection of the rural communities is portrayed. Set against the backdrop of a decadent, oppressive and fading feudal system these films in varying degrees uphold the rebellion and the collective power of the powerless.<\/p>\n

The one who owns the land holds the power. In a patriarchal feudal system, the hierarchy is defined likewise and defines the significance of caste and gender as tools of discrimination and hence oppression. Often this duality between the powerful and the powerless is contextualised with abuse where power almost always aligns itself with violence and sexual exploitation.<\/p>\n

In Ankur<\/em>, Surya, the landlord\u2019s son lives in the city. After graduating he is not allowed higher studies because of his indifferent results but more since his father feels that studying further to join a clerical job is a waste of time and money. Rather, the son must now take charge of their possessed land in the rural space and take care of farming.<\/p>\n

\"Ankur

Surya\u2019s attraction towards Laksmi becomes apparent<\/p><\/div>\n

Surya is markedly arrogant with everyone but cowers down before his father\u2019s personality. He is married to an underage girl before being sent packing to the village. Disgruntled and angry, Surya arrives at the village to take care of his father\u2019s farm in a vintage car and tagging along his record player. He portrays himself to be progressive and is vocal in his denial of \u201ccaste\u201d divisions as he starts eating food cooked by Lakshmi, the lower-caste maid. Her husband, Kishtaya, is deaf and dumb, a habitual drunkard yet a simple man for whom Lakshmi has affection and regard.<\/p>\n

As the film progresses, Surya\u2019s attraction towards Laksmi becomes apparent. His abusive behaviour toward others gets softened in his interactions with her. It is when Kishtaya is caught in theft he is punished and paraded in the village. Unable to cope with the shame, Kishtaya leaves home one fine morning. Surya\u2019s minor suggestions now become direct provocations to a sexually available Lakshmi. They soon get engaged physically on a regular basis as Laksmi stops calling him \u201cSarkar\u201d (\u201cmaster\u201d). Surya\u2019s fa\u00e7ade of modernity fools Lakshmi who finds a bleak future ahead of her without a husband or a child. As the emotional balance of Surya and Lakshmi tends to reach an equilibrium Surya promises Lakshmi of all earthly benefits and a vow to take care of her for eternity. This fake parity is heightened when Surya pacifies Lakshmi\u2019s doubts as he rhetorically asks, \u201cWho will make tea? Who will cook food? Who will look after the house?\u201d Lakshmi attains a false sense of self-worth, a misleading sign of approval as if her work is more than servitude and is being acknowledged.<\/p>\n

\"Ankur

Surya promises Lakshmi of all earthly benefits<\/p><\/div>\n

When Surya\u2019s upper-caste wife, Saroj, comes and stays in the village, she quickly takes over the reins of the household. She has come from the city with distinct information about her husband\u2019s misdeeds. As she takes care of the kitchen, Benegal craftily characterises Surya as the spineless hypocrite \u2013 it becomes evident that the \u201cWho\u201d in Surya\u2019s question to Lakshmi is never important if there is a woman who is available to do the chores. It doesn\u2019t take any time for Surya to replace Lakshmi with Saroj. The two are the same woman on the two sides of the caste coin, both sustain the patriarchal structure of division of labour and coining differential significance to indoor and outdoor work.<\/p>\n

If Saroj and Laksmi represent the duality of women in society, Surya and his father represent similar binaries in the other gender. Like his father, who has a second family in the village, Surya also, in his own way, propagates and maintains the same cycle when he impregnates Lakshmi. Surya hates his father, and his father dominates him, the recurrent power equation within the Indian male thriving to survive at the two extremes of the modernity spectrum.<\/p>\n

\"Ankur

It doesn\u2019t take any time for Surya to replace Lakshmi with Saroj<\/p><\/div>\n

The repudiation of the choice of women and their distressful locus is further explored in a subsequence which not only places Lakshmi\u2019s dilemma in perspective but also interprets the gaze of a male-domineering society. In this sequence, Rajamma, another village-married woman seeks separation from her impotent husband. Rajamma is dragged by the hair by her two brothers-in-law in front of a village council for justice. The village head, the decision maker, rebukes Rajamma for having a relationship with a man from a different village and different caste when she bursts out her distress \u2013 \u201chunger is not always of the stomach.\u201d The village head, a calm and composed man, decides that Rajamma must return to her husband. He explains his stance in no uncertain terms \u2014 a woman does not belong to her husband alone. She is also tied to family, caste, and community. So, even if her husband is improper, others in the family including his brothers may step in, a woman can\u2019t choose her sexual partner. Her role is only limited to being chosen. In another incident, on the eve of Diwali, Surya is engaged in gambling and drinking with the other upper-caste men of the village. In the drunken stupor, one of the men puts his wife as stake.<\/p>\n

\"Ankur

Ankur<\/em> stands out also because of Benegal\u2019s ingenious usage of technique<\/p><\/div>\n

Not only for the strong emotional quotient, Ankur<\/em> stands out also because of Benegal\u2019s ingenious usage of technique. Doors and windows frame the characters within or outside. After Saroj comes to stay, she opens a door to their bedroom as Lakshmi closes her at the further end of the house. Even though Lakshmi is at the cul-de-sac<\/em> of oppression being poor, uneducated and low-caste, she is not portrayed per say, as a victim. She is subject to Surya\u2019s gaze as he lazes in his bed and looks at her in long shots doing the household chores. And yet, in one defining shot, we find Lakshmi grinding spices on her own as the camera dollies rhythmically towards her. She is not conscious of her onlookers, she is within herself, focused and content. In the scenes where Surya gazes at Lakshmi in her work, we seldom find Lakshmi returning the gaze. Lakshmi is framed mostly in long shots interspersed with closeups of Surya instead of the traditional closeup camera gaze on the female body.<\/p>\n

This distance between the subject and object is reduced later once their physical distance diminishes. Quite carefully, the camera also slowly shuns a high-angle vs low-angle positioning and becomes more level. Yet, time and again through their different approaches to the agencies of power and modernism, viz. reference to cinema, the record player and others, their disparate position within the class system is hinted at with no ambiguity.<\/p>\n

Even within the bleak social construct portrayed in the film, the only glimmer of hope is the fact that Rajamma can throw her voice to be heard, wife of the gambler husband refuses to be wagered away, and Lakshmi against all odds is determined to keep her child even though Surya can\u2019t quite stand up to the pledges he made earlier to nurture her forever. The ending of the film, hints at the seedling of revolt when a nameless young boy throws a stone at Surya\u2019s house. It is the same child who previously acts as the informer who tells Surya about Kishtaya\u2019s theft. The boy may well be the ray of hope, defenceless and weak at present, but he exists without a doubt. Within Lakshmi thrives a little seed of life that may also, in future, raise its hand against those who wish to contain it.<\/p>\n

(Excerpted from\u00a075 Years 75 Films India’s Cinematic Journey<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Dhananjoy \u2013 Challenging the Criminal Justice System<\/a><\/strong> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shyam Benegal’s Ankur<\/em> explores class, caste, and gender dynamics in rural India, exploring the subjugation of women and their quiet rebellion against feudal power structures. Amitava Nag reviews this groundbreaking film.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":374,"featured_media":9484,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[420],"tags":[2605,2604,2606,714,1451],"class_list":["post-9473","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-indian-film-reviews","tag-anant-nag","tag-ankur-1973","tag-new-wave-indian-cinema","tag-shabana-azmi","tag-shyam-benegal"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/374"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9473"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9473\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9481,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9473\/revisions\/9481"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/learningandcreativity.com\/silhouette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}