PWNYCNY The British colonial authorities use a contrived incident to stage a show trial to prove Indian inferiority and thereby further justify Britain's continued colonial occupation of India. Through clever directing, this movie appeals to the audience's sense of outrage at the British who are impervious to the loud and widespread demands that they leave India. The tension between the Indians and English soon becomes apparent. it is this tension that becomes the basis for the drama that unfolds. A young woman arrives in India and confronted by her own sexuality has a mental breakdown and accuses her companion, an Indian physician, of attempted rape. This allegation further widens the rift between the Indians and the British, and intensifies calls for the British to leave. This in turn makes the British even more determined to put the doctor on trial and get a conviction. The Indian defense counsel considered the trial a sham, protests get louder, yet the British continue undaunted. This sets the stage for even more dramatics, which will not be discussed here. To find out the exciting conclusion to this story, and how tensions,, get resolved, watch the movie. This movie is a great work of art.

Wuchak Released in 1985 and directed by David Lean from E.M. Forster's novel, "A Passage to India" is a historical drama/adventure about a young English woman, Adela Quested (Judy Davis), who experiences culture shock when she travels to India circa 1920 to possibly marry her betrothed, a British magistrate (Nigel Havers). Her companion for the sojourn is his mother (Peggy Ashcroft). With a kindly Indian, Dr. Aziz (Victor Banerjee), they take an excursion to the mysterious Marabar Caves. But something strange happens at the caves and Aziz' world is turned upside down when Adela accuses him of a crime. James Fox plays Aziz' English friend while Alec Guinness is on hand as an Indian sage. This was David Lean's last film and, as far as I'm concerned, it's as great as his other films, like "A Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957), "Lawrence of Arabia" (1962) and "Doctor Zhivago" (1965). To appreciate it you have to favor his epic, realistic, not-everything-spelled-out style. The movie's about the clash of British arrogance & Victorian propriety with a fascinatingly alien and more wild Indian culture. It's thematically similar to 1993's "Sirens," highlighted by Davis' stunning lead performance and only hampered by Guinness' miscasting as an Indian (but that's a minor cavil). The film runs 164 minutes and was shot in India. GRADE: A-***SPOILER ALERT*** (Don't read further unless you've seen the movie)The movie goes out of its way to show that Aziz is innocent of attempted rape without spelling it out. So what happened to Adela in the caves? She suffered a panic attack due to culture shock and the mounting apprehension of marrying a prim & proper coldfish she doesn't love. The scratches she suffers are from the cacti she runs into while fleeing the caves. Aziz was her subconscious scapegoat. But, give her credit, she was able to resist immense social pressure, realize the truth, and boldly declare it, despite the negative social ramifications.

mark.waltz I've heard it said that class is really the ability to make everybody around you feel comfortable, and if that is indeed true, Dame Peggy Ashcroft's British lady, Mrs. Moore, is the epitome of class, graciousness and ageless beauty. For in this upper class British lady is a true lady, one who respects cultures others than her own by getting to know the traditions and honoring them as best as she can, even removing her shoes before going into an Indian mosque. With her younger traveling companion, the beautiful and young (but somewhat uptight) Miss Quested (Judy Davis), Mrs. Moore ventures to India to see her son whom Miss Quested is engaged to marry. Torn between the beauty of the culture and their curiosity about the Indians they encounter in contrast to the British rule, they befriend an eager Indian doctor (Victor Bannerjee) who offers to take them on a tour to the local mountain range which is both dangerous and beautiful, and when Miss Quested has a strange encounter inside one of the caves on the mountain range, Bannerjee is arrested and accused of assaulting her, resulting in a war of the two cultures with the Indians using this event to express their anger over years of British abuse.The beauty of the Indian countryside is certainly one of the main attractions of this hit epic directed by the legendary David Lean, and while it has its share of flaws, it remains excellent simply because the flaws represent "mystery" which this has plenty of. One of the biggest mysteries comes in the casting of the "vedy British" Sir Alec Guennis whose connection to director Lean goes back four decades. Playing an Indian wise man, he still sounds like Sir Alec Guennis and basically looks like Obi-Wan Kenobi in Muslim garb. Even as Adolf Hitler, I couldn't help but laugh, thinking of his comical role as the blind butler in "Murder By Death", and here too, the temptation to laugh is just too great, even with all of those fantastic performances in the Ealing black comedies and many great dramatic roles still embedded in my memory. Fortunately, his screen time is limited, and with Davis, Bannerjee and the Oscar Winning Ashcroft dominating the scene, his appearance is just a minor distraction.But there are so many other things to praise, whether it be the glorious Maurice Jarre musical score (which sounds like a "British march to India" theme), the wonderful photography and all of those psychological implications in regards to Bannerjee's friendship with Davis, his adoration of the elderly Ashcroft and Davis's encounter with erotic statues out in the middle of nowhere. The train ride, too, is phenomenal, with Bannerjee a bundle of child-like energy as he surprises Moore and Davis in their cabin by showing up on the side as the train crosses a very high trestle. Davis, obviously, is a very complicated and conflicted young woman, and Ashcroft has grown tired of her own culture's bigotry, and you just want to slap the woman who poo-poo's her desire to get to know the locals. "It's a mature of culture", she says, and like Dana Ivey's character in "The Color Purple", I just wanted to shake some decency into her. Their politeness is phony, often silent abhorring, so it makes Mrs. Moore a saint in comparison. This is where I first discovered the very gifted Judy Davis, the brilliant Australian actress I had heard of in regards to the earlier "My Brilliant Career", yet had not yet seen in the cinema. I instantly wanted to see more of her, and other than some supporting roles in delicious character roles, never had the opportunity to due to the lack of choices and her justifiable pickiness in choosing roles. To go from the conflicted Miss Quested to the legendary Judy Garland to the psychotic Santee Kimes (not to mention her roles in "Barton Fink" and "Husbands and Wives", to name a few), I have long wanted to see her on stage. She was admittedly a reluctant star in the making, but when I watch her, I feel that I'm seeing somebody else, not her. Like Helena Bonham Carter, who started off in young lady parts but moved into character roles, she's a true artist, and even if the filming of this for her had its share of issues with director Lean, she comes off unscathed and so totally memorable. Bannerjee's eagerness to please the snooty British might seem as patronizing to some, but this is a person who isn't hiding underneath the skin of who he is with his desire to reach out to human beings for the most part who think of him as beneath them. The chemistry between him and Ashcroft as great friends, even if briefly, is undeniable, and they are a great pair. To watch him turn embittered (but never loosing his humanity after after being publicly humiliated) is a very sad commentary on the inhumanity of the well-to-do upper-crust who really had no reason for taking over, especially since just a few decades later, they would be fighting against one of the greatest evils they'd ever known. That gives the question, "Does evil, disguised as class, really loose the fact that it's evil?" The ending shot of Davis reading a letter from Bannerjee's Dr. Aziz is really quite a commentary on atonement, and for the ability to learn about what real humility is.

vincentlynch-moonoi I identify quite a bit with this film. I've never been to India, but beginning in the mid-1980s I began frequent long summers in Thailand, and then lived there for a couple of years after retirement. Some of the same themes I see in this film I confronted in Thailand. You might think that odd since we are talking about almost a century apart from the novel and my travels, but the feeling not at home in a different culture could sometimes be pervasive. Being looked at as a foreigner was a common theme. And I often got off the beaten path and visited some pretty remote places...often alone...and a few times I felt sort of like the character Adela when she visited the overgrown Indian temple and was frightened by the monkeys.To begin with, this is one of those marvelous tales told by one of filmdom's greatest directors -- David Lean. It is, perhaps, not as ground breaking as "Dr. Zhivago" or "Lawrence Of Arabia", but it surpasses all his other films due to the haunting story so well told and the exquisite photography.It's a rare story that has so many interesting characters. The most interesting is Mrs. Moore, as played by Peggy Ashcroft. She is one of two characters in the story/film who seem to have a gut understanding of India and the unfairness of the British occupation. As Professor Godbole says, Mrs. Moore is a very old soul, and implies that in a former life she may very well have lived in India. Ashcroft is wonderful in this film! And, to a degree, the entire plot of the story revolves around her...even in death.The other character who understands things as Mrs. Moore does is Richard Fielding, as played by James Fox, the teacher. He doesn't hold to the strict class lines in the India of the time. I've always enjoyed Fox's roles in film, and this is certainly no exception.The third most interesting character is Dr. Aziz Ahmed, as played by Victor Banerjee. Ahmed, a doctor of the Muslim faith, is torn between disliking the British, and being open to them and their culture. He is particularly drawn to Mrs. Moore. Banerje is excellent here, as well.I wasn't overly impressed with Judy Davis, the young lady who has the breakdown in the caves, but she played the role satisfactorily.The one casting I disagree with here is of Alec Guinness as the weird Professor Godbole, a Hindu. Guinness does a fine job with the role...actually quite amusing, but why did David Lean have to cast a White person when there are so many talented Indian actors? Of course, the answer is that Lean and Guinness go way back. But I still think it was a poor casting choice.Nigel Havers does nicely as the Brit with the stiff upper lip as he is jilted twice. He is key to understanding the attitude problem the British had toward the Indians.Clive Swift was great at being the stone-faced British official...but we had no idea whether he had any actual acting ability. Ann Firbank, who played his wife, was better at being upper class snooty British.This film is, quite simply, a masterpiece of film-making.