Friday, April 19, 1974
University Daily Kansan
9
Indian Movie Evokes Viewers' Compassion
By ZAHID IQBAL
Kansan Reviewer
Movies from the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent often turn out to be utterly unbehievable melodramas wrapped around their characters. The surfeit of slapstick and exaggerated facial contortions. or they turn out to be costume extravaganzas with a dozen or so songs and dances—and the dolls of cottal posturing are often only thing that get a rise out of the viewers.
Rishikesh Mukerjee's "Anand," an Indian film soon to be screened on campus,
Although it is nowhere near Satyaji Ray's award-winning Apu trilogy, "Anand" (pronounced aa-numed and meaning joy) manages not to overdo the song-and-dance bit and maintains a fairly credible plot throughout.
The story is woven around a young man named Anand who, like his name, is joy and exuberance personified. Not that Anand has any particular reason to be happy or go around spreading good cheer; As far as his doctors are concerned, he is a dead man.
THE CANCER IN HIS intestine is incurable. Anand has six months to live.
The interesting twist is that the man knows he is dying and doesn't seem at all bothered. His philosophy is that he isn't dead as long as he lives, and he sets about making his "million moments" of life his happiest.
For Anand, happiness lies in making others happy. With his boyish charm, this is very easy. Soon, he has everybody praying for him and asking for a wife of one of his two doctor friends, prays to her Hindu gods for Anand. The matron at her husband's clinic is putting in her own appeals to Jesus Christ. And Anand asks the holy man a strange promise of immortality.
IN THE MEANTIME, Anand,
irrepressible as ever, continues to rcmp all
the place trying to amuse the very
friend们 who are suffering the pain
of knowing that his death draws nearer each
day.
Anand's favorite prank is going up to someone he has never seen and pretending he knows him. Each of these strangers is a fictitious Mr. Murrariel with whom an Anand friend is invited. Each other stranger Anand approaches this way ends up shaking hands with him, exchanging names and going away amused, if not harrow.
It takes an actor named Essaji to turn the tables on Anand. He admits to being Mr. Murrarial, knows exactly how much the two of them had drunk before passing out, speaks of their childhood friendship and calls Anand by the name Jachand.
When it is pointed out to Essaji that Anand's name is not Jachand, Essaji admits that neither is his Mr. Murrarial.
The two men become friends.
Anand, in the meantime, is also playing matchmaker and trying to get the other doctor, a friend named Blaskar, to marry him, but does not but has the nerve to propose to.
H SUCCEEDS IN GETTING the two together, and in the process, is blessed with a feeling of being in love.
It seems as if everyone wants Anand to live. And he seems as emilian and cheerful as ever. Only his two friends, the doctors, see death drawing inorably near day by day.
Anand alone seems unrefected. Is he laughing at life, or at death?
The movie is strangely moving and if one can bear with the imperfections that go along with some Indian films, it is a worthwhile experience. Technically, it is not one of the better Indian movies produced. Photography is unimaginative and some shots reflect poor camera work and inexperience in camera temperatures. Sound accuracy is pretty in some, with synch shot to pieces in some of the sequences.
BUT THEN, WHO CARES about hymn in the Hindu language is all Greek to it.
The subtitles are reasonably well done, if one can overlook the errors in grammar and spelling. The viewers have a very good idea, all along, of what's happening.
It is common practice in the subcontinent to pirate Western music for movies. However, at least three songs are not pirated and would rate well with an Indian audience simply because they are a song by one of the best and most popular Indian singers, Mukesh—all top-notch Indian singers.
As for the movie itself, it's not going to win any international awards. But for what it evokes from viewers in terms of human connection and compassion, it is well worth seeing.
Old Television Shows Revive '50s Nostalgia
By KENN LOUDEN
Kanaan Reviewer
Nostalgia is prevalent these days—especially nostalgia that centers on the 1950s. The Volunteer Clearing House will show several old television shows and shorts from that decade at 7 and 9.45 p.m. Hail Auditorium. Tomorrow in tomorrow in Westpaca Hall Auditorium.
Groucho is past his prince. He lacks the humor and energy he had in the old Marx Brothers' movies and he is obviously reading from a cue card.
Groucho Marx hosts his old show "You Bet Your Life" which includes some incredible contests. The first two are Tiger Woods and Justin Rose, who control the energy of a teenager, and Joe the Jacke.
THE SHOW IS FOLLOWED by a "Wildroot Cream Oil" commercial. The product contained cholesterol. Maybe that there were so many fat-heads in the 1950s.
An old "Superman" episode that has never been aired on television and was made for the Treasury Department is a good piece of propaganda. It's about government bonds, which at the time were a good investment.
Otherwise, the show is funny when it tries to be serious. The quality of the melodrama tends to be lower than those in the TV series.
played Superman, committed suicide.
THE FIRST "LONE RANGER" episode is shown. Indians might feel distressed after hearing Tonto contend with the pronouns "moi" or "micho." The ending is literally a cliff-hanger.
"The Phil Silvers Show" proves that Sgt. Bilko was the greatest pincer in the world, but the shows a poor second compared to "M-A-S-H."
"The Amos and Andy Show" is easily the best of the comedies. The jokes are oral and visual and many have been stolen by the writers for "Good Times". However, the show, like the "Lone Ranger", stereotypes a minority group.
ELVIS PRESLEY'S APPEARANCE on the "Ed Sullivan Show" is a ledge. He is a better performer today than he was in the 1950s, and it is impossible to understand why the female audience screams every time he tweets.
The best clip is "Nixon's Checker Speech" which saved his political career in 1982. Considering the events that are taking place in a hysterical funny piece of tripe,
TOGETHER THE FILMS provide a valuable social commentary on the 1590s. They should serve as a reminder that life is as great as some people would like to think.
"Last Tango at Potters"
Sponsored by Lawrence Gay Liberation, Inc.
Old Picnic Grounds Potters Lake
Saturday, April 20-8 p.m.-12 a.m.
-FREE-
Tense or Comic. 'Lesson' Is Good
By ALISON GWINN Kansan Reviewer
As the final presentation of the spring semester and in conjunction with its second Spring Arts Festival, Hashinger Hall is presenting "The Lesson," a one-act play by Eugene Ionesco, at 8 p.m. tonight, tomorrow and Sunday in the hall theater.
hungrily searching for knowledge from her omniscient professor. The relationship turns progressively more tense with the grating repetition of the pupil's "I've got a toothache" and the professor's constant, instantaneous reply, "Let's continue."
The play, which takes place in the study of an aging professor's home, is concise and
The three actors have done a superb job with Ionecova's script. For some, the play has comical incidents, such as all of the professor's mundane philosophies like "One
must always one one's limits," or the student's naive attempts at intellectualism, such as memorizing all of the products of all of the world's multinational tables.
approaches it in a serious mood, he might be pushed to the degree of tension that the players approach; if he comes to see it in an unusual light, his voice absorbed in the careful witness of the script and the amusing gestures of the pupil trying to follow the professor's wild exertion. "Whatever," the "Lesson" is a very effective drama, very convincingly performed.
Even though the play is occasionally comical, lonesome's purpose is completely serious. The play isn't to be seen at all as pure entertainment. Every line is intended, every action exactly planned and for that reason, the play isn't for a lazy mind. If one
reviews
fortunately so. The script is so filled with word plays and laden with supposed absurdist meanings, that members of the audience have little time to let their minds coast between the significant parts of the action.
The plot, as simple as it is, involves three characters: a nervous, indecisive old woman with an avid interest in Wichita graduate student; his young, saxacarine and very responsive student, played by Landa Wharton, Overland Park High School senior; and a player by Terri Walton, Topsperk sophomore.
The actors' interplay is excellent, which is necessary with a script that avoids superfluity as much as I laughed. The pupils enjoyed the obsequious, enthusiastic student
correction
Oliver Hall's production of "Guys and Dolls" will be performed at 8 p.m. April 25, 26 and 28. It was incorrectly reported in the film that the play would be performed this weekend.
Bring Your Fiddles,
Picks & Grins
Saturday, April 20
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