Phantom India- a documentary by Louis Malle (1969}
Widely regarded as the crowning achievement of his career, Phantom India, in 7 parts, 378 minutes, provides an epic-length portrait of life in India circa 1968. The film is as relevant today as it was on its release.
34-year-old Malle, terrified of falling back into the same bourgeois mindset, with his marriage in pieces, he headed to India, with a two-man crew. He travelled without maps, without any plan and shot documentary footage instinctively, over 30 hours of gorgeous and ground-breaking footage. He went there to escape and it turned into a voyage of discovery. He was fascinated with India: it’s contradictions, it’s ambiguities, its unwritten yet firmly entrenched social rules.
Phantom India was very much in the cinéma vérité (“real life”) tradition that first flourished in the 1960s. Without a script, without even lighting equipment, he just wanted to capture India’s people, culture and landscape. He wanted the images “to speak for themselves “. What makes it so special is his utmost sensitivity and respect for his subjects. It is not a mere travelogue-not a touristy India. What makes it exceptional is Becker’s skilful and fluid camerawork and Malle’s reflective and insightful commentary.
The result is a journey in pursuit of the mystery of India. Certainly India holds within its fabulous culture, many profound secrets about not only who we are, but the underpinnings of what we once were and the expanded possibilities of what we perhaps could be in the future. He mentioned: "Letting ourselves go in their presence we feel as if we’ve rediscovered something we’d lost. I’ve accepted another perspective of the world. It’s not about explaining or dominating the world but being a part of it, fitting into it”.
He shot languorously and diligently till he understood it. What amazes me is how quickly and correctly, he nails it. For example, he films Bharatnatyam students and concludes that the key is to loose all awareness of body! How can one? When this dance is all about gestures (mudras) and facial expressions! But he is totally correct as it is only when one forgets the limbs and becomes one with the music, the theme that the real grace emerges. He goes on to say that “it is not a dance, but a language, ney, a dialogue between the dancer and God!” That is some realization for a non-Indian!
Another scene is filming the enormous Rathyatra, (Journey of the chariot) that has no steering and no brakes and is pulled by multitude of devotees, with ropes thicker than elephant’s trunk. This 3-4 stories high chariot travels a ½ a mile circuit around the temple. When it turns a corner, my heart was in my moth! I feared that at any instant it was going to crash into the building. The journey takes 5 hours. He later spoke that you forget yourself and become one of the mass. That is the only way to experience India- let it sweep over you!
He travelled the length and breadth of India within those four months. As enamored as I am with India, I had not even heard of the two aboriginal tribes he filmed. Both tribes have secluded themselves from the rest of the country. He hiked miles and shot the almost primitive tribe Bondo in the North and in complete contrast, most civilized Todos in the South. He had footage of 30 hours and took a year to edit it. It was shown in France as a serial and a couple of years later on BBC in U.K. It was never shown in India as the Government took exception to it. If only we can look at ourselves objectively!
The series is made by Criterian Collection and is available on Amazon. Calgary Public Library has a copy. I recommend that anyone interested in learning about the essence of India, watch it.
