| THE TERRORIST Director: Santosh Sivan "Most of the films that deal with violence end up showing a great deal of it and then say, at the end, 'No, it's not right.' So I was making a cilm on a very violent subject, but I wanted to have the audience go through a process so that they might say at the end, 'No, I don't want to see this blast,' even though that's perhaps what they came for." Santosh Sivan Loosely based on a real life incident The Terrorist is an impressive first feature by famed Indian cinematographer Santosh Sivan about Malli (Ayesha Dharkar) a young woman who has the formidable task of carrying out the assassination of a national politician. This is the second foreign coming-of-age film this year (the other being Not One Less from China) that deals with a teenage girl thrust into an important position beyond her years. In this one, the young woman must choose between her commitment to a political cause and her responsibility as a woman facing motherhood. Malli is hired precisely because of her uneducated background, her lack of experience and her innocuous youthful appearance. The rebel leaders know that such a young mind can easily be brainwashed and in time they get her so primed for murder that her leaders refer to her as "a thinking bomb." What’s immediately striking about The Terrorist is the cinematography, which utilizes multiple lenses and deep focus techniques to emphasis the isolation of Malli against everything else in the background. It’s easy to see where director Sivan’s talents lie with his fabulous use of sharp close-ups, expressionist lighting and multiple lenses to enhance each scene. At times it’s almost too glossy and aesthetically pleasing considering the subject matter. Most of the first half takes place in a rain forest with extreme close-ups of Malli's face, which usually has rainwater dripping off of it. As the film goes on and she moves from the forest to a rural farm the camera pulls away from her a bit and more objects and people begin to share the frame with her. Perhaps this is the director’s way of getting into the mind of Malli as she becomes less focused on the assignment and more aware of the world surrounding her. While waiting to get directions to carry out the assassination Malli meets and gets involved with a man. Her time spent waiting for directions from her leader changes her attitude and she begins to acquire an understanding of the value of life. And once her perspective has changed she realizes she has become pregnant. But this is no sappy what I learned at summer camp type film. It is instead a fascinating and suspenseful film that explores many significant issues: including the role of women in India, the purpose of revolutions and the responsibility of the individual to the people around them and to themselves. There is also a pretty big statement about the highly untraditional role of Indian women as revolutionaries. Technically - with its glossy look and loud audio track - The Terrorist is quite the opposite of India’s most famous filmmaker (the late) Satyajit Ray, whose films relied a lot on deep focus photography and stayed close to neo-realist sensibilities. But it still has a reality base in dealing with economic and political situations in India and all the actors -- except the one that plays Malli —- are non-professional. Mainstream Indian cinema is actually similar to Hollywood cinema in that the films have little substance and are more concentrated on entertainment and spectacle rather than big issues. This film is as much an art film in India as it is here but it’s also better than most films released on a regular basis in either country. See it while you have the chance. - Matt Langdon |