Mangal Pandey: The Rising

What is the definition of a good movie? Has there been any movie ever made that satisfies everyone's definition of a good movie? Perhaps not.

My definition of a good movie is something that commands my attention from start to end and that helps me exercise my intellect. A good movie makes me feel good when I talk about it.

A good movie can belong to any genre and can definitely have its own style (sometimes completely original). The Rising did not have a focus on the character development of all of its lead roles, like a typical movie, but that seems to be intentional. It was a little frustrating to see some movie experts dwelling on that issue.

The rising is about the character transformation of an idealistic but confused man called Mangal Pandey. It shows how he realized the true meaning of freedom and how it was passed on to an oppressed nation. The minute details of his personal life did not need any depiction in the movie. That could stir up even more controversy especially for some people in our subcontinent who need so little to feel offended and create chaos. The movie also shows the genuine remorse of a great soul like Captain Gordon who constantly tried to bring balance between rule and fairness. Hundred years old history became alive in the remarkable performances of the crew and the cast in this movie.

The movie is a masterpiece in almost all aspects. I sincerely have not seen many Indian movies of this standard. The only criticism I would have is the placement of the holy festival which could have been discarded in favor of showing more development of mutiny preparation, politics of the Indian kings and above all some more drama. The last 15-20 minutes seemed to have hasted a bit. The dance sequence of the two gypsy girls also felt a bit out of place.

Overall, I must say that I felt deeply satisfied after watching this movie.

This epic tale of the first Indian uprising (mid 19th century) has so much going for it, it's hard to know where to begin. Firstly, it documents a period of history that tends to be airbrushed under the carpet in British history lessons. Germany and Japan are still constantly reminded of the atrocities their countries committed, but we have to go back a bit earlier to look at the British East India Company - the most successful business enterprise in history, controlling one fifth of humanity, and having its own army. The value of being reminded brings a certain sense of humility. It maybe even helps to explain some of the feelings one can sense just walking about Delhi today as a white person.

It's also a rare treat to have an epic of this scale, told from an Indian point of view, in English (or mostly in English). It successfully merges factual history with cultural norms, mythology, song and dance, grand battle scenes, touching romance and heroism.

The British East India Company was subject to the uprising or 'mutiny' largely because of a failure to understand and respect local customs (from a purely military point of view, George Bush should consider bringing more or better historians to the White House). Having been subjected to abominations and still helping the Company fight wars, Indians rallied over a deeply held religious insult and attacked the British rulers.

It is a great credit to the filmmakers that the British have not been demonised. There is no dwelling on the greatest excesses and neither are the Indians portrayed as flawless. For instance, we see a British soldier preventing a local (forced) sacrifice of a young wife at the burning of the corpse of her 60yr old husband, and the excesses of the British depicted are those common in most armies where power has led to degeneracy. We see not only the forced cultivation of poppies, but shady dealings with the resultant drugs and the Indians always coming out the losers. We see houses of prostitution set up to 'keep the troops healthy'; Indian soldiers treated as second class citizens with brutal punishments for minor slips handed out by self-important British officers.

But whenever it gets too grim to watch, it springs the Bollywood trick of bursting into song and dance. The only other genre that routinely manages such a happy switch is grand opera. The slave courtesans sing joyously with double edged lyrics about being a slave to love. The spectacle of glorious colour and wonderful dancing spectacle entrances us.

Many great conquerors have been also ruthless and uncaring to those they abused. The British East India Company was perhaps no different, and at worst should perhaps be judged more by the morality of the time than present day international law. But that way of thinking is a get-out. Invading another country is almost always for selfish reasons, glossed over in one way or another according to the double-talk of the day. History usually sides with the victors.

The Rising will not get the marketing it deserves in the UK: many will avoid it because of the Indian songs. But it is a film well worth catching.

My main quibble is that India is constantly portrayed in movies (including this one) as incredibly clean. I have never found this so, except in 5 star hotels enclaves. There is a great water shortage and most streets are pretty unhygeinic by Western standards. If Calcutta was the paradise of colour and good health depicted in The Rising, then it's gone backwards, whatever the improvements in basic freedoms and human rights. But realism it not Indian cinema's forte.

I liked the whole atmosphere of the movie and the professional outlook. There should be more movies like this rather than the same soapy mushy mushy romantic movies.

The story built up nicely, from the point where Mangal (Aamir Khan) was just a normal soldier to the point of him fighting for freedom and leading from the front. The Foreign cast in the movie such as Toby also did a great cast in making the movie professional rather than a joke.

Heera(Rani Mukherjee) and Amisha did a good job although their roles were small. But it was needed since the emphasis was not them but Mangal.

All in all, a worthwhile movie. Although many dispute its originality and historical facts, with the amount of historical facts available, the movie was well directed and shot. Inspiring and the ending made my heart heavier .

Kudos to Aamir Khan for the dedication he put into the production of The Rising, an unfairly over-hyped film, that sets out to deliver the story of Mangal Pandey.

The fact that Aamir took 4 years to make this film complete with growing his locks and that awesome moustache along with tons of research is an anomaly in the Bollywood film industry. Films are churned out 3/day at the last estimate, but Aamir being the professional he is, waited years to make this movie after the unprecedented success of his Oscar nominated Lagaan.

Without a doubt Aamir carries the film on his shoulders. There were many naysayers about the fact that Aamir may have been a bit lacking in the height department for the role of a freedom fighter, but when you see his towering performance on screen, his small frame is all but forgotten.

The man is Indian Cinmas answer to Edward Norton from Hollywood. A great actor for his generation who is going to continue to bring Indian cinema (not bollywood masala flicks) to the international audience....i think it's his calling. Amitabh Bachchan seems to have chickened out of this task of elevating Indian cinema to an art rather than a mockery that it usually is.

Without a doubt another actor who comes close to stealing the film away from Aamir is British actor Toby Stephens... i was under the impression that his role would be quite small. Instead he has a fully fledged three dimensional character who is in the entire movie. And on top of that, he acts the entire movie in Hindi. A best supporting actor nod is in order.

This film could theoretically get an Oscar nod (unfortunately a win maybe a hard sell). The songs are probably distracting for a Western audience, but they'll have to live with them.

The film does fall short of being an all time classic. But i think we may have to wait for the initial hype to settle down, because the movie is without a doubt the best one of 2005.

The film is slow to start, with the first half being an introduction of all the characters. But pre-interval, the story and Aamir Khan rev into the 6th gear, getting ready for the inevitable Rising post interval.

Get this. I think the movie could have been a bit longer. A little more development was needed with some of the glossed over aspects of British rule.

But, all in all, a magnificent effort from all involved, especially Aamir Khan and Toby Stephens.

8/10

I am amazed at the negative comments about this film, especially from India. I'll address those criticisms later after providing a summary of the film.

Set in 1857, the film tells the story of Mangal Pandey, a sepoy (private) in the 34th Native Infantry regiment of the Bengal Army (the army of the Presidency of Bengal, governed by the British East India Company and recruited largely from upper caste UP and Bihar stock). Mangal is depicted as an ordinary soldier who is offended by the introduction of the new Enfield rifle cartridges which were greased with pig and cow fat (the former anathema to Muslims and the latter sacred to Hindus). The movie shows him changing from a loyal Company sepoy who saved a British officer's life, to one who ends up questioning the logic of British rule. Other themes include his friendship with the same British officer, the officer's rescue and subsequent romantic relationship with a sati - a widow expected to burn herself on her husband's funeral pyre,and a prostitute who exclusively services the English brothels but falls for Pandey. The movie brings opium cultivation, corruption within the Company, the growing distance between English and Indians, as well as backward, traditional Indian attitudes into sharp focus.

All in all, the film is highly entertaining, a good story - well told, with powerful performances by the main characters. Aamir Khan is in his element, living the character of Pandey and conveying a fantastic portrayal of the soldier who realizes, bit by bit, that his loyalty to a foreign army makes him as "untouchable" as the low-caste man or prostitutes he scorns. Toby Stephens performance as the outsider in British India (Scottish, poor schooling, too fraternal with the natives) was brilliant and his chemistry with Khan was the high mark of the film's dramatic impact. The music by AR Rahman is louder than usual and some of the beats are frankly out of sync with the times ( the lesbianish gypsy dance number was a bit much!!).

The strength of the film was in conveying a sense of the time period - costumes,hair-styles, sets, manners ( the English officer's "Koi Hai"), were exactly what one could expect. The historical background was fairly accurate (sati was outlawed, opium cultivation was forced, the Company was beset by corruption, the English did have European only brothels) though the exact interpretation of events may have not been supported by history.

Which brings me to the criticism of the film. these seem to be of two variants - one, the film was not entertaining enough, and two, the anguished howl of the historians who decry its historical illegitimacy in the hope that no one may turn nationalist by seeing this film.

I will dismiss the first criticism, since that may be a matter of taste - certainly, desi (Indian) audiences raised on simpler story lines and poorer production values (see Asoka and n number of Indian period dramas) may find The Rising a bit heavy to digest.

Historically, the film may be inaccurate in the sense that Mangal Pandey may not have been the nationalist as portrayed, the relationships with the English officer and the prostitute are probably fictitious. But are they impossible? NO. The film has a paragraph disclaimer about inaccuracy at the beginning but this does not satisfy the history lobby. Why is it not possible that the official version about Pandey - that he was under the influence of bhang ( a hallucinogen) when he shot and killed an officer and then tried to shoot himself - is dressed up to cover the Company's stupidity in introducing the greased cartridges? Its not as if such "doctoring" of history has not taken place - witness the designations of "Mutiny" on the British side and "First War of Indian Independence" on the Indian side - when it was something in between? Secondly, why is The Rising being targeted when virtually every Indian film plays merry with historical events and characters? Akbar and Salim did not go to war over a dancing girl (Mughal-e-Azam), Shah Jahan was not the devoted son depictd in Taj Mahal but an ambitious usurper, one hopes that Ashoka was not the ghastly caricature depicted in Shahrukh Khan's film, and certainly India was not administered by ARMY officers as shown in Lagaan b ut by a civil ICS administration.

Similarly, Hollywood glosses over the fact that getting the German Enigma machines in WW2 was a purely British affair (U-571 shows us otherwise), and of course America won the war (no mention of UK/Common wealth forces, or more importantly - Soviet forces).

What I am saying is that films always distort history a bit - and so long as they are not conveying a completely different story - that should not matter. A purist on the matter of history myself, I am surprised by the vehemence of the historical community's attack on the film. My guess is that they do not want a false sense of nationalism to emerge on the basis of the Mangal Pandey story. They are a hundred and fifty years late in stopping the myth from taking hold.

In the end The Rising is a great film, a great story, well shot, with a few excusable omissions.