Man has always been interested in Life behind Earth; we have always craved to know if there are other species living in this galaxy that may be more intelligent and what is the purpose of their life? What if the life which we believe to be real is not actually real but an illusion created by senses? Where do we go after die? Are we born again? These are some of the perennial questions for which mankind has been searching answers for since the start of existence.

The movie is set somewhere in the future, when the energy crisis of Earth is resolved. Lunar Industries has discovered a fuel which they harvest on the far side of the Moon; apparently it is clean and efficient energy. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is the sole human in this energy base, on a three year contract. He has A.I. GERTY 3000 for company, which is voiced by Kevin Spacey. Sam communicates to his office and wife by video messages, his only source of human interaction are these video messages. Sam is eager to go back to earth as his 3 year contract is coming to an end in two weeks.

Three years in space with no human interaction is a long time for a human being, I doubt any human being would survive that. We slowly learn from the video messages that all was not well with Sam and his wife; they might have been separated for some time due to his temper. Sam is on the verge of nervous breakdown, we never know if this is the return of the condition which his wife refers to, did he take this job to stay away from society. Sam starts to hallucinate and starts seeing people, the audience does not know at this point that this is a relapse of his condition.

Sam meets with an accident, while he is outside the spaceship. When he wakes up in the infirmary, GERTY informs him that he was involved in accident and he will be confined to infirmary till he gets better. Sam is disturbed by visions; he decides the only way to find out the truth is to go to the site of accident. Gerty shows the video message from corporate office of Lunar, in which they ask Sam to stay in the space ship as rescue team will be on its way. Sam senses something is amiss and does not know the whole situation. He tricks GERTY, to let him go to the accident site. Sam discovers something which changes his life.

The narrative of the movie is such that if I write anything more it will spoil your fun while watching it. Sam Rockwell carries the film on his shoulders, and for a major part of the movie, he is on-screen with no other actor to interact. He never disappoints us, and this is a movie which clearly shows why Sam Rockwell is one of the best actors in Hollywood has today.

The background score by Clint Mansell takes the story forward and haunts you. It creates an eerie feeling while watching the movie and full marks for using the score so subtly instead of those films where the BGM is so loud that you cannot even hear the dialogues.
The movie was shot in a mere 33 days, with a modest budget of 5 million USD. This movie reaffirms my belief that you do not need to spend lots of money; all you need is good script which can connect to the audience.

This was the directorial Debut of Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie. He later went on to make Source Code.

Here’s the revised version of Space Oddity originally sung by David Bowie, this video features the social media savvy astronaut Chris Hadfield on board the International space station.

But much before cable-tv was introduced and much before reality shows made an appearance, came the movie Hero Hiralal. It was the vision of Ketan Mehta that he weaved such a tale which seemed pedestrian to begin with, but ended in a crescendo. It was a reality show of high-voltage drama and very much ahead of its times, when nobody had come-up with such a concept.

The movie released in 1988 and I saw it a couple of years later in DD. The movie starts in a typical boy-meets-girl format. We are introduced to Naseeruddin Shah as Hiralal who drives an auto in Hyderabad. He is a big film buff and that’s how gets the title Hero. His friend Mohan Gokhale plays a movie-poster-painter and one of the landmark dialogues of the movie was ‘phata poster, nikla hero’.

A film troupe arrives in Hyderabad to shoot a movie and Roopa, played by Sanjana Kapoor in her debut movie, is the lead actress of the movie. Hero falls head over heels for her, he takes her round the city in his auto .Kiran Kumar plays the lead opposite Roopa in the movie that’s being made, and Hero keeps landing up during the shooting. He whisks her away and they spend a lot of time together, exploring the city in his auto. Roopa is just being friendly but Hero mistakes her overtures for love.

The movie shooting is complete and the entire cast moves back to Bombay. Hero, in his desperate bid to announce his love to Roopa, reaches Bombay. When Roopa dispels all his notions and feelings of love, Hero decides that life is not worth living and he wishes to end his life.

That’s when Sitara Devi, a publicity agent, enters his life. She does not want Hero to end his nondescript life in such anonymous fashion. She wishes to make his death a mega-event, to announce to the world about the pain and subsequent death of a lover and thereby make him a love-martyr. She turns, what would have been an incident [his suicide], into an event.

Huge hoardings are drawn-up all over the city, declaring this reality show as a must-watch. Lots of publicity is done and people queue-up to buy the tickets. There is media frenzy and reporters scamper to Roopa and and Sitara Devi for exclusive interviews. People on the streets start discussing this event and Roopa starts questioning herself whether she loves Hero or not; and what she can do to stop him from sacrificing his life.

Meanwhile Roopa is being closely guarded so she does not escape to meet Hero. Kiran Kumar and Rohini Hattangadi, playing Roopa’s mom, keep a vigil on her. The talk of the town is Hero and his game-of-death, the tickets are all sold out. People are for the first time going to witness a volunteered death in broad-daylight amidst public eye, and all for love. Hero’s unrequited love has brought him so close to death.

The day of the event has finally arrived. People and media throng the venue and Hero is tied in a glass tank and water starts filling into the tank. Roopa flees from her home, and helping her cause is Amitabh Bachchan, in a special guest appearance who drives Roopa to the venue of the event. Can Roopa stop Hero from giving away his life? Will she stop Hero by declaring her love to him so he has a good enough reason to live for? Will Sitara Devi let someone disrupt the show? Will love triumph?

Naseeruddin Shah was marvellous in the movie, he displayed great restraint. Sanjana Kapoor in a debut performance was good as well. Rohini Hattangadi as Roopa’s mom was just about ok. But Ketan had kept the most important role for his to-be wife Deepa Sahi who played Sitara Devi with lot of strength and vigor. She brought the shrewdness and wile into the character, she was fantastic. And of course, Ketan Mehta as a film-maker, excelled in his artistic vision.

The movie’s unique concept of exploiting people’s emotions for commercial gains is much like the reality shows of today; where behind-the-scene activities, emotional outbursts, minor squabbles and disappointments, impoverished backgrounds are highlighted for higher TRPs. Every incident is micro-managed to gain maximum publicity. Curiosity is generated and the public is made to wait for days together for the events to unfold. The media/event-managers are desensitized and they neither care for the trauma and desperation of the participant nor for the consequences of such unethical event management, much like Sitara Devi in the movie.

In 1988 we had one Hero Hiralal, but in 2013  we have hundreds of Hero Hiralals on every show in every channel. What was a figment of Ketan Mehta’s imagination is now unfolding in every drawing-room with people glued to their couches waiting for their Hero Hiralals to appear on-screen. Phata poster, nikla Hero!

She has now come up with a new 1 minute short film, Piya Aiso Jiya Mein which looks slightly unconventional. Here’s a chat that we had with Oorvazi to find out more about the film. But before that have a look at the film yourself.

Q: This is an unusual yet original short film. What thoughts prompted this cinematic experiment?

O- A: Primarily there is so much hype around the 100 years of Indian Cinema, I thought how can I make a meaningful artistic comment in a concise manner which is both a tribute and a critique at the same time. Hence this idea was born.

Q: The film seems very simple at the surface and the viewer could easily miss the point, but the work has an interesting thought and is obviously complex with multiple layers unfolding, can you elaborate a bit about the thinking behind the film and the cinematic form you have used? And can we call it a musical?

O-A: Let me start by saying that any work of Art prompts and evokes the viewer to ‘see’, ‘look’ and ‘perceive’ the subject of the work in this case Indian Cinema in a fresh new light – Art takes you intuitively to the heart of the subject while experiencing beauty. More like a poem or a painting. Here for example there is the beauty of the music, the close up of the eternal human face, the eyes which express the inner mental state, the mirror motif etc.

Yes you are right by defining it as a musical as it is the song that drives the film which embodies the emotion and the progression of the film. ‘Song’ itself is a very unique and integral part of Indian cinema which is put into play in my experimental short film and is my chosen mould to explore as an artist.

The film is akin to a love poem with the theme being the ‘quest for the beloved’, however there is a character graph and the protagonist is transformed in the end.The song as you know is iconic from Guru Dutt’s film Sahib Biwi Aur Gulam and I have replaced the image of the legendary actress Meena Kumari and deliberately used my face which is then a universal representative of all females and have taken the avatar of the ‘Nayika’(heroine). I have kept the first lines of the song from the original which I have lip synced and the last section has my voice with the message. The line with the message is my original line camouflaged in the song lyrics. In the process the film begins with paying a tribute to the beauty and charm of Indian cinema and then ends on a note of expressing the desires for change – the liberation of the identity of women in Indian cinema.

Q: The film does not have elaborate sets, locations or characters but is focused on one individual and that too in close-up with just one prop. Were you apprehensive about its appeal?

O-A: No! As I believe an artist needs to set up certain creative limitations, these are the challenges that then help create a unique work. The choices that you make are then what make it special. We see so many films that have big sets and big budgets but maybe do not leave you with a stimulating thought to ponder. The choice of the close-up was because besides it being an important form of the original iconic song itself it helps the filmmaker to draw attention to the beauty and grace of the minute expressions of the face and the emotions are expressed through the language of the eyes which is rare in contemporary cinema.Today I feel more and more that the ‘female body’ has replaced the ‘face’ in songs in Indian cinema stressing the physicality ‘Love as sex’and with this is lost the depth of emotion. The personality of the heroine is more about her sexuality than her as a human being, commoditized. Liberating the role of women in cinema is not just about making her sexually active but instead more about treating her as an individual, giving her gender equality.The Indian women still remains caged in the patriarchal system of oppression –of individual self-worth, and their identity is limited and dependent to the male. This is a strong message that the film subtlety puts out.

Also the close-up was necessary and part of the exploration as the film is dealing with the ‘Shringar Rasa’ (one of the key Rasas in the ancient Indian treatise on Indian art – The Natya Shastra) of union and separation in Love and finally discovering that ‘Self’ and ‘Truth’ is truly finding the beloved. The film is to be understood in the context of the nuances of this rasa where Love is far beyond just physical eroticism but envelopes the beauty of the experience of Love and the movements of eyebrows, eyeballs, sweet glances and delicate smile, along with down cast glances and closing of eyes – is a vocabulary beyond words and the Natya Shastra is rich with minute descriptions of ‘glances’ as a whole exploration – some of the glances for transitory states are Lajjanvita(bashful), Lalita (amorous), Ardhamukula(joy or bliss)which are humbly touched upon in my small experiment besides other aspects.
The simple motif of the mirror in the film plays an integral role and is charged, in it lays the clue of the transformation and discovery of ‘Self’.

Finally an artist creates the work and thus created is an expression of a labour of love, the audience adds their own self to it and accepts and completes it or rejects the work and leaves it as an incomplete communication. I have no problem if the audience cannot identify with my work but I feel the audience needs to understand the context with which the film is to be viewed and then accept or reject it.

Q: And lastly, can you tell us why did you choose this particular Meena Kumari song ?

O- A: Meena Kumari fascinates me as a persona on screen and in real life. She has a very strong presence and her eyes are soulful. She is one of the few actresses who haunt you with her beauty and pathos. Meena Kumari has been an iconic actress during the golden era of Indian cinema. Her persona embodies the ’eternal yearning’ for the beloved both in real and reel life, and I wanted to pay her a tribute by completing her story and liberate her at least in the creative realm with this short experimental film.

… Yes, there will be a time to look back at that episode too – and I strongly believe that someday time will tell the tale – but that ‘time’ is not now… Today I’m remembering the tale of a different ‘time’ here…

21st or 22nd April, 2009. The last day of our films’ shoot in Assam. We had to shoot round the clock in order to finish before the general election, the voting for which was scheduled for April 23rd in Assam. And we have kept the shots in the bosom of river Brahmaputra towards the end. Because, we wanted to capture the vastness of the great river on camera – and only towards the second half of April, with the pre-monsoon showers, the level of the river starts rising thus forcing the wintry sand bars to disappear. Whoever has experienced Brahmaputra during monsoon will tell you that the great river resembles a sea during those times – where you can’t see the other side standing on a bank. That is the affect we wanted to capture on camera.

On the preceding night, while shooting the sequence where the extremist drops the protagonist of our film Abhijit on the river bank after sailing through the river at night, we got a small demonstration of what the river is capable off in its rage. The shooting involved 3 boats – the actors were in one boat whereas two boats were tied together to make a platform for the shooting crew. The boat with the actors was sailing by the bank whereas ours’ was further in the middle of the river, to capture the actors’ boat along with the river…it was pitch dark and late in the night and suddenly a storm blew in … The boatmen in the actors’ boat managed to take it to the bank, but ours being a little more deeper side of the river, the boat broke free of the experience boatmen’s control … they just couldn’t control it from being dashed against the bank … yes, the planks and bamboos joining our boats were smashed to pieces… We thanked our stars as no one got injured…

But we had a film to shoot. So we were back on the river the next day, to shoot the crucial beginning and the ending sequences. In the late afternoon, as we finished taking the last shot, suddenly we realized that our boat was ‘struck’ there in the middle of the river! On enquiring, we realized what had happened – due to the rise in the water level, the sand bars in the middle of river had got submerged. But water had not risen enough to float the boat – so our boat, being a big one (yes, we ensured on a proper bigger boat for the crew, wiser by the previous night’s experience!) got stuck in the sands below whereas the actors’ boat, being a much lighter one, could easily sail back…

As we waited for help to arrive, suddenly I had a surreal vision… I saw a person walking towards us on the water, in the middle of the river!! Well, it took a while for the logical side of the brain to come up with an explanation – that guy must have had his farm house in the recently sub-merged sand bar, and seeing a boat getting stuck he is merely coming for a closer look, fully aware that the water level is not more than a feet high in the sand bar….

As the darkness fall, after what seems like an endless wait, help arrive in the form of another boat. And as we unburden half the load in the new arrival, the old boat – much lighter now – also floats and start moving…

The journey back in the bosom of the great river on that pitch dark night was truly a memorable one. The boatmen were warning us to look out for the herd of wild elephant that swims across the river during those time… our cinematographer Madhu Ambat sir requested the boatmen to shut off the lamp so that we can enjoy the journey in the darkness … few of the crew members were singing songs to make the darkness more colorful… and finally relieved and happy seeing the light on the approaching bank (those were the lights lit up for our next shot on the river bank)…

Looking back today, the whole experience comes across as such a beautiful analogy to our existence itself… in life, at times, we had to face storms… our boats gets stuck in the mid river… things seems to get all dark and gloomy… but if we continue our journey with a smile in our lips and a song in our heart, we are bound to reach the lighted shore to continue our journey, as the life flows…as the River flows…

For those who’ve yet to see the promo of my film (Assamese version), here it is

“Benegal has put up a model of committed film-making in a thoroughly professional manner that could be eminently useful for both the mainstream, with its recklessly expensive habits, and art cinema, with its holier-than-thou attitude and amateurism.”

It is ironical that talking about Shyam Benegal is extremely easy as well as quite difficult at the same time.

Considering the repertoire of films that he has given us over a period of last 35 years or so, it is easy to slot him as the “art-house” director. However, look closer, and the diverse topics that he has addressed over the years, talking about secularism, pluralism, democracy, equality of opportunity, human rights, women’s rights, study of human psyche, superstitious myths embedded in our culture, satire, etc humbles us to the extent that it becomes impossible to gauge the vast repertoire that he possesses about understanding the human nature and the reflections of shifting nature of our social values.

While Ankur and Nishant are about the oppression of women, Bhumika is about a woman’s dilemma of the need for security as well as insistence on freedom. Mandi is a satire at society which needs a prostitute and rejects her at the same time; Kondura is about the prevalent superstition and the embedded myths in our predominantly puritanical society. Kalyug is a present-day take on Mahabharata and the shift in our social values and Suraj Ka Saatwaan Ghoda is a nostalgic and individualistic take on the self-mocking reflection of our shifting social values with a non-linear narrative.

One of the major central ideological strands of Benegal’s works has been the documentary-style film-making, represented by films like Manthan (Milkmen), Susman (Handloom Weavers), Antarnaad (Fishermen), Samar (Dalits’ equal opportunities), Hari-Bhari (Women’s right of reproduction). A deep-rooted social and political activism underlies such abiding concern to change the world in a constructive way. They are highly purportive films with a Gandhian – Nehruvian model of self-help and micro-cosmic coöperation to bring about a change in the plight of the oppressed and/or overlooked, to make them self-supported and respectable.

History also intrigued Benegal, and he channelized the awareness among people through films like Junoon (a slice of realistic portrayal of history of 1857 Mutiny), Trikaal (the past, present & future interaction of Portuguese history), Bose: A Forgotten Hero (misunderstood and misinterpreted Netaji), Bharat Ek Khoj (arguably the best dramatised take on Discovery of India by Nehru) and The Making of Mahatma (the life and times of Gandhi before he became one).

Benegal also made a sort-of trilogy about the Muslim Women: Mammo, Sardari Begum and Zubeida, incidentally all the three written by Khalid Mohammed.They marked a virtual waking up to the mute existence of Muslim women, of which the Indian cinema has been by and large blissfully unaware despite the participation of so many actors, and the observation of the three respective protagonists of these movies takes in the entire community seen through the most intimate and most vulnerable section, the women. The three films are a study of the intra/inter-community equations in general, and their impact on the lives of the protagonists and the others related to them in particular. It was a tough call to walk the thin line of demarcation between being artistically persuasive, and being targeted for the insensitivity in portraying prospective volatility. However, probably what kept him in good stead was the fact that he had spent his formative years in Hyderabad, a city known to have better communally-balance demography, as well as the fact that he lived among six sisters, and all of them were strong-headed, dominant and non-submissive in their own way.

Each of his films brought him closer to people and realities. It was an exercise in self-education about diversity of life around us, and taking pride in achieving small things and celebrating them in a big way. His films have been pivoting around contemporary Indian experience of inherent problems and their solutions in the development process and social changes. He was highly influenced by Satyajit Ray and Ritwik Ghatak during his early days and his founding of Hyderabad Film Society during college and the subsequent association with Calcutta Film Society broadened his ideological persuasion and sensibilities.

New Cinema was a new way of looking at cinema, which started happening at different places during different times: in Bengal during early 50’s, in Kerala and Karnataka during early 60’s, and in Orissa and Hindi Cinema during the 70’s. Benegal was against the standardised images of the mainstream commercial cinema, as they represented nothing, and it was his quartet of new cinema that virtually started it all. Ankur, Nishant, Manthan and Bhumika will always be remembered for starting the wave in Hindi cinema. It was the process of new wave, and it broke away from tradition. Other like minded directors followed, and though Benegal’s films always managed to find patronage due to various reasons, the others faltered as they were not able to lure the mainstream audiences to the theatres, who were used to the standardised images. Thus, for the most part, the new cinema functioned on the margins, and slowly this wave phased out due to lack of success by mid 80’s.

One of the major reasons why Benegal’s films managed to find audiences and make money was because he explored ingenuous ways for his film’s funding. He neither depended upon a money-bag to fund his films because he didn’t want to play into their hands and compromise on the ethics of the new cinema, nor did he ask for Government’s funding, unlike others, because he felt the Government money was the public money, which was never loaned with a view of refunding, as per the general perception of the public, and the cushion of that knowledge would make him take his art and commitment for granted, since he won’t have to strategy to bring the audiences to the theatres to break-even, therefore his work might get inferior.

Manthan was a classic example of co-operative funding in which almost five lakh villagers donated two rupees each for the film, and when it released, they all flocked to the theatres in droves to watch “their” film, thereby ensuring it was commercially a hit. Similarly, Susman was for the Handloom Cooperative, Antarnaad was for the fishermen and Yatra (TV series) was for the Indian Railways. It was later that he ‘accepted’ funding from NFDC for Suraj Ka Satwaan Ghoda and Mammo. The Government of India also officially agreed to fund Samar through Ministry of Social Justice and Hari-Bhari through Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, realising the social relevance of the concept and the growing awareness among people towards the far reaching impact of films of Shyam Benegal.

Benegal also introduced the use of local dialects in his movies to give them the genuine flavour and feel, as it was instrumental in connecting with the roots and influence the local sentiments. Films with the specific rural set up would necessarily have the dialect of that region, like in Ankur, Nishant, Kondura etc. While Manthan was at the scripting stage, the dialogues were in proper Hindi, though the film was based predominantly in Gujarat. The film could not be made entirely in Gujarati, since it would alienate a lot of prospective non-Gujarati-speaking audience, and Hindi was somehow not giving that feel of originality. Sensing a prospective disconnect with the local flavour, Benegal and his team introduced a dialect with Gujarati interspersed generously with Hindi. The end result was so believable that in certain sections of the media, Manthan was hailed as the first “Gujarati film” to have such a pan-India reach!

Benegal always maintained that he could not work with actors who were not knowledgeable about the craft of acting, and that was the sole reason most of his actors were handpicked from stage, or from the institutes like FTII and NSD. Benegal has been perhaps the only filmmaker to have introduced such talented actors in his films like Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah, Smita Patil, Shabana Azmi, Anant Nag, Amrish Puri, Mohan Agashe and Kulbhushan Kharbanda, among others. All of them continued working with him because he was their friend, family, their emotional support, their punching bag, financier  anything and everything but a ‘director’. It sure helped that all along, his wife Neera was a continuous source of support and comrade-in-arms in all his endeavours. Now that role-play is strengthened by his daughter Pia as well, who is a fashion designer and an emotional support, as well one of his critics.

There is an interesting trivia about his choice of actors. Immediately after having completed Ankur, Benegal was looking for an actor who could play the role of the young brother in his next venture, Nishant. Around the same time, Girish Karnad, the then director of FTII, was grappling with strike at FTII by the students of acting course. The strike was led by a fiery and charismatic student, who was not ready to budge from his stand or compromise at all. Considering the sort-of-stupid reason of the strike, Girish Karnad felt that the leader-boy must be a great actor to create such a nuisance out of nothing. When Benegal approached Karnad, both already friends by then, for a suggestion for the role, Karnad recommended the leader-boy for that role, not so much because he was convinced of his qualities, but more so because he wanted the trouble-maker out of his reach and have some peace of mind. He was, of course, auditioned and found to be perfect for the role and was immediately cast by Benegal. And that was the beginning of the career of one the greatest actors of Indian cinema we now know as Naseeruddin Shah. Incidentally, as all of us already know, Girish Karnad was also a part of Nishant, and had to come face to face with Naseer on the sets, so he didn’t have his absolute peace of mind after all…

The Government of India and the film fraternity has of course recognised Shyam Benegal’s contribution towards cinema, and the various awards and portfolios that he has held over the years is a testimony to that. He was teaching mass communication in FTII from 1966 to 1973, and subsequently twice became the Chairman of FTII, once from 1980 to 1983, and again from 1989 to 1992. He was a member of the National Integration Council from 1986 to 1989, and he was also the Director of NFDC for almost six years. He was conferred Padma Shree in 1976 and Padma Bhushan in 1991. He was also awarded the Dadasaheb Phalke Award in the year 2007. He has won the National Award a record 17 times, out of which 7 times has been for Best Hindi Film.

All this achievement looks expected for a boy who conceived and made his first amateur film at the age of 13 with the help of a camera given by his still-photographer father. And it humbles us when we know that he has achieved so much even though he made his first feature film at the age of 39! At almost 78, the great man is still going strong, and has so much left in him to offer to us, we only pray he can give some more films to remember him with before he finally decides to hang his boots for a life of absolute retirement. But knowing him, it is unlikely he will ever call it quits.

Years of watching ‘The Wonder Years’ and several other films from the 90s have attuned us to this wholesome pure form of Americana.

Imagine what happens when a film shows you the cracks between the white picket fence, the critters that flourish under the yard. Of course you flinch, but you keep on watching because darkness does draw us in.

Bill Paxton‘s excellent debut feature Frailty is an exercise in getting his audience to flinch. Repeatedly and intensely. Frailty’s concerns lie with the Meiks family (Yes, pronounced as ‘Meek’). The two Meik siblings, Fenton (Matt O’Leary) and the younger one Adam (Jeremy Sumpter) are lovingly raised by their widowed father Bill Paxton (curiously referred to only as ‘Dad’).

Things usually go downhill when your father starts talking like this.

They are a happy little bunch, Dad’s a blue collar worker who’s gentle and caring and Fenton obediently looks after his kid brother. Their early scenes together radiate such warmth that it only punctuates the horror that unfolds. Dad wakes up one night after having a ‘vision’ from God. He says God’s chosen their family to slay down demons. Demons who look like human beings but have done cruel deeds and must be slain before judgment day. Fenton looks dismayed, understanding that his father may have lost his marbles but young Adam believes every word he says.

Things only proceed to get more gruesome.  He asks his sons, mere kids aged 7 and 10 to join him on this quest. Bill Paxton is careful enough to not make the Father seem psychotic; he’s still the same gentle soul who has utter conviction in his visions. When he brings home his first demon, a middle aged woman, Fenton is shell-shocked. Dad says when he touches her, he sees all the sins she committed. His body starts convulsing and it’s supposed to mean something. But what exactly?

Fenton keeps questioning his father, who is patient at the start. As their confrontations start getting edgier, his father starts getting harsher. He first punishes him by asking him to dig a 10 ft. wide hole for their family cellar. Even when he punishes him, it’s not out of spite, he is only doing it to help his son see the way of God.

There are many murders in this film, but we see no bloodshed onscreen because Frailty is not about violence.

 It’s about the psychological violence Adam and Fenton endure.

Putting kids in danger is an old enough cinematic trope. Frailty draws its inspiration from an even more urgent minefield of feelings. You see Adam and Fenton aren’t in danger in the usual way you have seen in films. They haven’t been kidnapped, or are standing on a slippery ledge of building. These two kids are stripped away of their innocence and are driven to a path so dark, it leads straight to hell.

And, who is the person doing this? Their own father who truly believes that it’s the best for his family. As if the film doesn’t have enough surprises up its sleeve, its chronology adds a few more. The film starts off with an older Fenton (Mathew McConaughey in another stunning role) walking into the office of FBI Agent Wesley Doyle (Powers Boothe) because he has some information to share about a brutal murderer called the ‘Hand of God’. The conversation between them forms the crux of the story and unravels some previously unseen details.

There’s a twist at the end and it’s so unbelievable and brutal,

it makes the film seem like a Stephen King novel.

 No wonder King himself heaped praise on Frailty upon its release. Frailty would never have been made without the character actor Bill Paxton stepping up to direct it. You see for any other director this film would be career suicide. But for Bill directing would never be his sole source of income. Though that shouldn’t take away any praise from him. He works well with actors and extracts honest performances from kids, which is a darn difficult job and I speak from experience. Unfortunately Frailty can be a dull film to look at. It resembles the work of a first-time director with most of it shot in close ups. He should have done something to light the film in a way that it highlighted the religious undertones. Nonetheless this film makes for a nice roller coaster ride by switching gears between suspense and surrealism.

To finish off this post, here’s a near Malick-ianshot from Frailty.

Random Cinema Trivia – Lionsgate Films once used this corny thing for their Credit Rolls