A Passage to India (film)

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A Passage to India

original movie poster
Directed by David Lean
Produced by John Heyman, Edward Sands
Written by E. M. Forster (novel)
David Lean
Santha Rama Rau (play)
Starring Victor Banerjee
Art Malik
Saeed Jaffrey
Roshan Seth
Judy Davis
Peggy Ashcroft
Alec Guinness
Nigel Havers
James Fox
Music by John Dalby, Maurice Jarre
Cinematography Ernest Day
Distributed by Columbia Pictures
Release date(s) Flag of United States December 14, 1984 (NYC only)
Flag of United States 25 January 1985 (wide)
Running time 163 min.
Language English
IMDb profile

A Passage to India is a 1984 film directed by David Lean, based on the novel of the same name by E. M. Forster.

Contents

[edit] Synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The film is set during the period of growing influence of the Indian independence movement in the British Raj. It begins with the arrival in India of a British woman, Miss Adela Quested, who is joining her fiancé, a city magistrate named Ronnie Heaslop. She and Ronnie's mother, Mrs. Moore, befriend an Indian doctor, Aziz H. Ahmed. Dr. Aziz meets Mrs. Moore for the first time in the moonlight at an abandoned mosque on the river Ganges, and he soon finds that Mrs. Moore possesses a sensitivity and unprejudiced attitude to native Indians which endears her to him. When Mrs. Moore and Miss Quested profess an interest in seeing "the real India" (as opposed to the Anglicised environment Ronnie and his friends have constructed for themselves), Aziz offers to host an excursion to the Marabar Caves (to avoid asking them to his shabby bungalow), a local geological oddity.

Miss Quested and Mrs. Moore agree readily, and the outing goes reasonably well until the two women begin exploring the caves. Mrs. Moore experiences an overwhelming sense of horror which completely quenches her good humour; worse, Miss Quested forms the delusion that Aziz is making sexual advances toward her. She flees the cave in a panic and is discovered running headlong down the hill, bloody and disheveled. Aziz is immediately jailed to await trial for attempted rape, and an uproar ensues between the Indians and the Colonials.

Miss Quested is not a vindictive or even an unusually neurotic person; rather, she is suffering from an abnormal mental state brought about by multiple factors--the remorseless heat, the strangeness of her surroundings, her growing dismay over her future husband's small, mean character, and (perhaps) her feelings of attraction, fraught with shame, for Dr. Aziz. Even as her case becomes a cause celebre among the British, her mind gradually clears and she realizes she has made a mistake. There is also a subtext present in the film concerning Mrs. Moore's feelings concerning old age and her impendng mortality. Though she waits bed-side with Miss Quested in support, she makes clear to Ronnie that she firmly believes in Aziz's innocence. Because of her refusal to testify, and the fear by the Anglo-Indians that she would bolster the case of the defence Mrs. Moore leaves for England. She subsequently suffers a heart attack on the voyage.

To the consternation of her friends, Miss Quested clears Dr. Aziz in open court. The Colonials are forced to make an ignominious retreat while the Indians carry Dr. Aziz out of the courtroom on their shoulders, cheering wildly. In the aftermath, Miss Quested breaks off her engagement and leaves India, while Dr. Aziz doffs his Western attire, dons traditional dress and withdraws completely from Anglo-Indian society. Although he remains angry and bitter for years, the final scene shows Miss Quested at home in England, reading a letter from Dr. Aziz conveying his thanks and forgiveness.

[edit] Adaptation

While the film is relatively faithful to the novel, the ending is changed. The book ends with a bitter Aziz talking about how the British must be driven out and telling his British friend that because of their nationalities they can no longer be friends; while it is implied that someday British and Indians might be friends, the book concludes that it could not happen in the present. While scenes invoking Aziz's anger at the injustices foisted upon him and all native Indians, and his resolution to quit British India, the film concludes with a later scene of Aziz forgiving Miss Quested. It may be argued that this waters down Forster's original didact about racial tensions and Indian independence.

[edit] Production

[edit] Casting

Alec Guinness agreed to the role as Godbole despite having quarrelled with David Lean in the early 1960s. Lean had wanted him to play the title role in a proposed film about Gandhi (a project ultimately scrapped). According to Guinness's biography, Lean wanted him to play Gandhi because he felt "Hindus couldn't act". Guinness and Lean quarreled again on Passage to India, as they had on most of their other collaborations, and most of Guinness's scenes were cut for timing reasons. Guinness called it the worst role he ever did. (Piers Paul Read, Alec Guinness: The Authorized Biography.)

E.M. Forster told Peggy Ashcroft he hoped she would one day play Mrs. Moore when he met her in 1960s, during the run of Santha Rama Rau's stage adaptation of Passage to India in London. Ashcroft was indeed cast in the film, largely due to the lobbying of Alec Guinness. Celia Johnson was also considered for the part. (Kevin Brownlow, David Lean: A Biography, p. 650)

Peter O'Toole was Lean's first choice for the part of Fielding but the role eventually went to James Fox. (Brownlow, 672-3) Fox's brother Edward is erroneously listed by several sources as the performer of the role. (see, for example, the IMDB Cast List)

[edit] Filming

The "Marabar Caves" in the film and novel were based on the Barabar Caves, some 35km north of Gaya. Lean visited the caves during pre-production but found them unphotogenic; concerns about bandits were also prevalent. Instead he used two separate hills a few miles from Bangalore, where much of the principal filming occurred, and the caves themselves were created by the production company. [1]

David Lean isolated much of the cast and crew by taking solo credit for the editing and screenplay despite the collaborations of others. He quarreled with many cast members, including Guinness, Judy Davis, and Victor Bannerjee, and frequently insulted James Fox, who refused to fight with him[citation needed]

[edit] Reception

A Passage to India did moderately well at the box office, taking in some $26 million in the US, but was not a blockbuster hit. However, the film was a critical success and revived Lean's reputation as a great film maker. Today, the film is highly thought of, but is generally considered not on a par with his earlier epics.[citation needed]

Salman Rushdie critiqued this film in his essay "Outside the Whale."

[edit] Principal cast

[edit] Awards

[edit] Academy Awards

Winner

Nominated

[edit] Golden Globes

The film won the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Film.

[edit] Connections with other films

According to Peter McLuskie of the Museum of Broadcast Communications, Passage of India can be linked to "a cycle of film and television productions which emerged during the first half of the 1980s, which seemed to indicate Britain's growing preoccupation with India, Empire and a particular aspect of British cultural history" [2]. McLuskie suggests that other films n this cycle include Gandhi (1982), Heat and Dust (1983), The Far Pavilions (1983), The Jewel in the Crown (1984) and Lord Mountbatten: The Last Viceroy (1985). This preoccupation extended to "escapist" fare like the James Bond adventure Octopussy (1983), and even the Hollywood film Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984), which were also primarily set in India.

[edit] External links

David Lean
1940s In Which We Serve (with Noel Coward) | This Happy Breed | Blithe Spirit | Brief Encounter | Great Expectations | Oliver Twist | The Passionate Friends
1950s Madeleine | The Sound Barrier | Hobson's Choice | Summertime | The Bridge on the River Kwai
1960s Lawrence of Arabia | Doctor Zhivago
1970s Ryan's Daughter
1980s A Passage to India
Television Lost and Found: The Story of Cook's Anchor (1979)
Preceded by
Fanny and Alexander		 Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film
1985		 Succeeded by
The Official Story
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