The whole documentary / Chapter :
http://cuwholechaps.blogspot.in/2015/04/neros-guests-psainath.html
It can be hard to notice that India has an agrarian crisis. For isn’t this the land of a thousand cuisines, an exporter of grains? Don’t its teas color the milk of hundreds of countries, and wasn’t the hunt for its spices the refrain of history? Evidently, the government and mainstream media did not notice, somehow blinded to the two hundred thousand Indian farmers who committed suicide over the past ten years . But all that changed when Nero’s Guests came along.
Last Thursday, AID (Association for India’s Development) and Nazar – A South Asian Perspective hosted a screening of this documentary as part of the India’s Age of Inequality Series.
Nero’s Guests isn’t just an eye opening film; it glues your eyelids to your forehead with such force that I’m sure many were watching with quite a startled expression on their face. The film draws heavily from the work of P Sainath, a celebrated journalist who helped bring the issue of farmer suicides to the national limelight. Nero, the infamous Roman emperor, drew light for a lavish party by burning alive convicted prisoners and slaves. As Sainath poignantly points out, the true interest in this story isn’t as much in Nero’s actions as his guests’ inaction; these men and women accepted his gracious hospitality and enjoyed their night of revelry without once objecting to his cruelty.
http://cuwholechaps.blogspot.in/2015/04/neros-guests-psainath.html
It can be hard to notice that India has an agrarian crisis. For isn’t this the land of a thousand cuisines, an exporter of grains? Don’t its teas color the milk of hundreds of countries, and wasn’t the hunt for its spices the refrain of history? Evidently, the government and mainstream media did not notice, somehow blinded to the two hundred thousand Indian farmers who committed suicide over the past ten years . But all that changed when Nero’s Guests came along.
Last Thursday, AID (Association for India’s Development) and Nazar – A South Asian Perspective hosted a screening of this documentary as part of the India’s Age of Inequality Series.
Nero’s Guests isn’t just an eye opening film; it glues your eyelids to your forehead with such force that I’m sure many were watching with quite a startled expression on their face. The film draws heavily from the work of P Sainath, a celebrated journalist who helped bring the issue of farmer suicides to the national limelight. Nero, the infamous Roman emperor, drew light for a lavish party by burning alive convicted prisoners and slaves. As Sainath poignantly points out, the true interest in this story isn’t as much in Nero’s actions as his guests’ inaction; these men and women accepted his gracious hospitality and enjoyed their night of revelry without once objecting to his cruelty.
Nero’s Guests is everything you would expect from a documentary of this kind: it is hard hitting; it is serious; it is touching and galvanizing. But its greatest strength lies in how it nails the holy grail of film-making – it is gripping. I cannot recall a single moment of boredom. Deepa Bhatia, the director, is rightfully unobtrusive for the most part, asserting her presence only when necessary. The picture of a man whipping himself for others’ entertainment flits in and out of the narrative in one memorable segment of the film, reinforcing what was happening to the farmers themselves. Frequent quotes from a farmer’s poems also intersperse the movie, bringing a depth of meaning to what was happening in the way that only poetry can.
Every film needs its star, and in P Sainath we have a veritable central character we can get behind. Sainath is a powerful orator, and his words fuel the narrative. His opinions are strong, his speeches carefully crafted for maximum impact, and he is thunderously vociferous in defense of his beliefs (as a poor Finnish man who cast aspersion on the quality of Indian coffee discovered). This, clearly, is a man who has found his calling in life, for what else can motivate someone to trudge through thousands of kilometers in India’s villages to collect statistics?
It’s good to know that he’s not alone. There are others, people who would staunchly turn down compelling invitations from Nero without a second thought; some of them were present that day in the darkened room where Nero’s Guests was screened. They drove forward the question and answer session at the end, pointing out intriguingly similar agricultural maladies in places like Mexico and South America. There was a reasonable turnout for an event of this kind, leading to spirited discussions. Unfortunately, time constraints prevented a few more opinions from being heard.
What I witnessed in that room was not the kind of spectacle that one typically expects from films made in India. But this movie, combined with the discussion that followed, woke thoughts that have laid appeasingly dormant at the back of my mind. And that is exactly why Nero’s Guests is a great documentary. Highly recommended.
About:
The mainstream media today is totally degenerated and corrupted as it does not cover anything that is not “breaking news” or that is not considered “glamorous” enough to catch eye balls. For this obvious reason, Nero’s Guests has been completely ignored by the mainstream media (both print & electronic) and is not given its due space & visibility.
The subject itself is not new to any of us and it has become a part of our daily lives - mere statistics. It is about the severe agrarian crisis that the country is faced with, as a result of which farmers are still committing suicide and as many as 200,000 farmers have already paid a price by giving away their lives, over the last decade or so. It has been written, talked and debated about in certain sections of the press; but the film is extremely thought provoking, highly emotive, heart rending and at times is absolutely shocking and painful.
The angst and frustration of journalist P. Sainath, Rural Affairs Editor of The Hindu (Protagonist and the man behind the film), is highly contagious. His aggressive and emotionally charged narration (supported with well researched facts and data) has been able to drive home the message loud and clear. It not only brings out the absolute failure in handling of the crisis by the respective Center and State Governments (both BJP & Congress) but also their complete apathy & inaction towards the crisis, government after government.
Directed by Deepa Bhatia, a noted Bollywood film editor with heavy commercial titles such as Taare Zameen Par and My name is Khan to her credit, this one comes out as a brilliant body of work in the script, the fluid edits without any frills and fills.
Sainath’s talking straight into the camera between the shots, apparently without any pre-rehearsed lines and caution, immediately connects with the audience through interactive viewing and a strong storyline.
Though would love to but rather not talk about the title of the film that finds its origin in Roman History and Tacitus – I would leave it to Sainath himself for he alone would be able to do full justice explaining the background and the relevance of the title to the subject.
The film is a documentary on ground report, narration of facts and situation in the rural India. It does not talk about any solutions or remedy. Sainath believes there could be more than one way to solve the agrarian crisis but it is the apathy and inaction towards farmers committing suicide that actually brings him to this business.
Finally, it was this below line in Credits that drew my attention:
This documentary has been realised with the support of
The Jan Vrijman Fund
Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland
For those in a rush, just to get a glimpse of the documentary, here is the Trailer, courtesy: IDFA.
Conclusion:
Every film needs its star, and in P Sainath we have a veritable central character we can get behind. Sainath is a powerful orator, and his words fuel the narrative. His opinions are strong, his speeches carefully crafted for maximum impact, and he is thunderously vociferous in defense of his beliefs (as a poor Finnish man who cast aspersion on the quality of Indian coffee discovered). This, clearly, is a man who has found his calling in life, for what else can motivate someone to trudge through thousands of kilometers in India’s villages to collect statistics?
It’s good to know that he’s not alone. There are others, people who would staunchly turn down compelling invitations from Nero without a second thought; some of them were present that day in the darkened room where Nero’s Guests was screened. They drove forward the question and answer session at the end, pointing out intriguingly similar agricultural maladies in places like Mexico and South America. There was a reasonable turnout for an event of this kind, leading to spirited discussions. Unfortunately, time constraints prevented a few more opinions from being heard.
What I witnessed in that room was not the kind of spectacle that one typically expects from films made in India. But this movie, combined with the discussion that followed, woke thoughts that have laid appeasingly dormant at the back of my mind. And that is exactly why Nero’s Guests is a great documentary. Highly recommended.
About:
The mainstream media today is totally degenerated and corrupted as it does not cover anything that is not “breaking news” or that is not considered “glamorous” enough to catch eye balls. For this obvious reason, Nero’s Guests has been completely ignored by the mainstream media (both print & electronic) and is not given its due space & visibility.
The subject itself is not new to any of us and it has become a part of our daily lives - mere statistics. It is about the severe agrarian crisis that the country is faced with, as a result of which farmers are still committing suicide and as many as 200,000 farmers have already paid a price by giving away their lives, over the last decade or so. It has been written, talked and debated about in certain sections of the press; but the film is extremely thought provoking, highly emotive, heart rending and at times is absolutely shocking and painful.
The angst and frustration of journalist P. Sainath, Rural Affairs Editor of The Hindu (Protagonist and the man behind the film), is highly contagious. His aggressive and emotionally charged narration (supported with well researched facts and data) has been able to drive home the message loud and clear. It not only brings out the absolute failure in handling of the crisis by the respective Center and State Governments (both BJP & Congress) but also their complete apathy & inaction towards the crisis, government after government.
Directed by Deepa Bhatia, a noted Bollywood film editor with heavy commercial titles such as Taare Zameen Par and My name is Khan to her credit, this one comes out as a brilliant body of work in the script, the fluid edits without any frills and fills.
Sainath’s talking straight into the camera between the shots, apparently without any pre-rehearsed lines and caution, immediately connects with the audience through interactive viewing and a strong storyline.
Though would love to but rather not talk about the title of the film that finds its origin in Roman History and Tacitus – I would leave it to Sainath himself for he alone would be able to do full justice explaining the background and the relevance of the title to the subject.
The film is a documentary on ground report, narration of facts and situation in the rural India. It does not talk about any solutions or remedy. Sainath believes there could be more than one way to solve the agrarian crisis but it is the apathy and inaction towards farmers committing suicide that actually brings him to this business.
Finally, it was this below line in Credits that drew my attention:
This documentary has been realised with the support of
The Jan Vrijman Fund
Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland
For those in a rush, just to get a glimpse of the documentary, here is the Trailer, courtesy: IDFA.
Conclusion:
Sorry, but Socialism and Socialist Policies can just do this much. A step ahead, Socialist Liberalism is nothing but Crony Capitalism. It can only make the rich even richer and the poor even poorer, thereby increasing the divide, the poverty and the disparity among its citizens. And if this is topped with the corrupt and inefficient governance, we can only thank God for not taking us through a civil war already. There will be many more Nero’s Guests and life will go on.
If this has to change for good, we need to look for serious alternatives – alternatives to change the complete system of governance – to throw away Socialist Policies and embrace Freedom and Liberty.
First of all, the educated common man has to come out of this “I don’t care” attitude, tagged as “Apolitical” and start seriously thinking about connecting with Politics and Governance, as a responsible citizen. This does not necessarily mean everyone needs to jump into active politics, but everyone must be politically aware and actively support a political movement or initiative that could bring about a change to the degenerating Indian Polity which also matches to their personal ideology. There are plenty of such new initiatives trying to make a difference in this space and one has to just look around, identify and connect with.
One such serious movement catching up momentum, the one and only propagating concept of Freedom and Liberty is Freedom Team of India (FTI). Please join FTI as a Freedom Team Member or just become a Freedom Partner to connect with and support FTI on various social networking platforms. There is a lot happening around here and one just needs to “get involved” to feel the excitement
First of all, the educated common man has to come out of this “I don’t care” attitude, tagged as “Apolitical” and start seriously thinking about connecting with Politics and Governance, as a responsible citizen. This does not necessarily mean everyone needs to jump into active politics, but everyone must be politically aware and actively support a political movement or initiative that could bring about a change to the degenerating Indian Polity which also matches to their personal ideology. There are plenty of such new initiatives trying to make a difference in this space and one has to just look around, identify and connect with.
One such serious movement catching up momentum, the one and only propagating concept of Freedom and Liberty is Freedom Team of India (FTI). Please join FTI as a Freedom Team Member or just become a Freedom Partner to connect with and support FTI on various social networking platforms. There is a lot happening around here and one just needs to “get involved” to feel the excitement
0 comments:
Post a Comment