K.M. Madhusudhanan gives us a look into the early enchantment of film in a small village in Kerala, and the aura around the mysterious Bioscope. As for the history of the bioscope, this early device gave rise to silent film, and moving images to later form cinema as we now know it. The bioscope show was known to be one that travelled with fairs in the early 20th century. The film itself looks at the unique parallel in a country such as India where the divine forces were and continue to be one of the supreme forces that people believe rather than the rational reasoning's of science. Diwarkaran the protagonist in this tale becomes fascinated with the science around the bioscope while away from home at a fair. The bioscope belongs to Dupont, a Frenchman who teaches Diwarkaran about it and passes it on to him to continue doing the shows throughout the region. The imagery created by the film allow Diwarkaran an escape from his reality, the reality of his wife Nalini's illness. Nalini suffers from an illness that the family has been unable to find a cure for through the means of regular medicine. The family looks at the divinitive realm, and spiritual healers to help with Nalini's condition. Nalini's condition causes her to re-live a moment in her life via a reel that keeps playing in her mind, driving her deeper into herself while her husband's film reel drives him further and further outside of himself as her travels with the biscope show.
The fascination for me with this film came from my experience as part of the Indian culture. Divinity and science do not meet eye to eye in India, as we see through the village gossip in the film about the bioscope being some sort of haunting magic trick. Although science is prominent in large cities now a days, in villages where there is little education, often it is difficult for people to fathom new ideas. The ideas that are believed by most in the Indian culture are with respect to religion, spirituality, and divinity. Although we can see this more apparently in many eastern cultures, it can be visible in North America as well. In India however you will see the belief in ritual, God, and the divine everywhere you step, and this belief is stronger than any other you will see in the land of beautiful divine chaos. Those that question it often are left wondering why they did as does Diwarkaran's character in this film.
You can get a glimpse into the early introduction of cinema in Kerala and Tamil Nadu and a look into the impact of science on a society that believes predominately in the divine at the Globe on Saturday September 25th, at 12:45 pm.
