Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.
Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.
He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him.
Is a copywriter preparing an advertisement campaign to propagate cannibalism among human-beings? One has to see the above mentioned statements within their context and to get that he has to know about their historical/mythological existence.
What can wash away my sins?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
Oh, the blood of Jesus!
Oh, the blood of Jesus!
It will never lose its power!
If 7KM was/is a murder mystery thriller for one then s/he has to own a responsibility of watching the film with a wrong frame of mind.
Sophocles would tell a story and it would fall upon psychoanalysts like Freud, Adler and Jung to investigate the story by putting it under the scanner of psychoanalysis. They are the people who would generate new words to nominate this complex and that complex. Sophocles and alike would not bother about giving a treaty on any syndrome in their creations.
The star trio of psychoanalytical field might not be able to clearly define the motives and life of Susanna of Ruskin Bond/Vishal Bhardwaj. Possibly they would have coined some new terms to define her characteristics and words like Susanna complex/or syndrome would have taken birth. One can not impose an old complex on her character as it is not there. She is a new character as a character can be in the world of fiction.
Art also exists within the context.
But before anything else kavya (Poetry) & sangeet-rasik may not mind reading following few verses -
Dekh to Dil ke jaan se uthataa hai
Ye Dhuaan sa kahan se uthataa haiBaithne kaun de hai phir usko
Jo tere astaan se uthataa haiYun uthe Aah us galee se hum
Jaise koi jahan se uthataa haiIshq ik ‘Meer‘ bhaaree patthar hai
Kab Dil-e-Natwan se uthataa hai
This creation of Meer Taki Meer has 5 more Ash’aars and Rasiklog would definetely not mind listening and watching Mehdi Hassan singing Meer‘s verses. One, who watched the film with full attention, might have felt a thirst for the Meer‘s full creation.
Even after reading or listening it, Meer‘s creation would not automatically bring its complete understanding to the reader/audience. A reader/listener has to do some efforts on his own to understand the meanings hidden behind the words and poetical arrangement of the words used by Meer. One has to do that much (hard) work.
Vishal Bhardwaj had not become as poetical in any of his past films as he has become now in 7KM. Poetry does not come directly to the reader/audience. 7KM would also not come to the audience on its own and he will have to show a willingness to walk an extra 1/2 a mile to search the gate to enter this small Labyrinth. Once inside its territory, one can find various meanings residing in its different structures.
Vishal Bhardwaj presents a christian tale but he also mixes a hindu/Indian interpretation in it. Over indulgence propagated by Lokayata of Charvaka finds a place here and penance suggested by Jainism also makes an entry. It includes a journey from heterodox system to orthodox system. Vishal Bhardwaj uses references from the traditions of Hindi and Urdu literature also.
To enjoy the film completely one has to accept the context of the film which is related to the human being’s quest for salvation. This quest is one of the ancient most desires of human beings.
Even in the ordinary matters of the life a person like Heeraman [Renu's stroy- Mare Gaye Gulafaam's hero/ and Basu Bhattacharya's Film - Teesri Kasam's hero], gets his lessons after committing 3 successive mistakes in his life. Some may get success after making 1 or 2 mistakes and some may go for 4,5,6,7, or 8 or 9 mistakes and some may commit god knows how many mistakes before they correct their ways in their respective lives.
Susanna (Priyanka Chopra) spends few decades of her life in the search of a true love. She desires for a man who w’d shower a total acceptance on her. To fulfill this desire she marries 5 times but she gets disappointments from all her marriages and she kills all her husbands. She kills her husbands but not a single time she enters into the widowhood and she continues remaining a woman searching for the love and meaning of/in her life.
7KM has 7 chapters and each chapter is a short film in itself and Susanna is a common element combining these tales into her biography.
Susanna passes through the Capital Vices in her life. Everybody passes though one or more or all of these stages. Only difference remains there that while many may not reach to their destinations, Susanna actually manages to reach there. She develops a desire to lead her remaining life in pursuing a search for the salvation. She breaks the bonding with her hell like worldly life to pursue her new journey.
Lives of Susanna’s 6 husbands have also stuck in the territory of one vice or other. They even do not want to come out of the circles of vices. Susanna had to pass through few vices because of her relationships with these men. But if Susanna had not met any of the 6 men, sooner or later she still would have passed through many or all of these Vices, because her very nature stood on a foundation made up of PRIDE.
“Miss Sahib does not change her ways she just shoots the Dogs bothering her on the way”, says Ghalib Khan, Susanna’s Aide cum Butler, to Arun (Vivaan Shah).
Susanna is a lioness. People can victimize her for a little time but this happens because she surrenders before them and because she trusts them initially. She certainly can not be tamed forever. If one tries to exploit her then she may take her own time to retaliate but she surely strikes back and when she comes into the action, she does it in a most fatal way and her target can not be spared.
While going into the life of Susanna, it will be relevant to go through a creation of the great poet Sahir Ludhianvi where he had raised some questions (via Meena Kumari) –
Art is not some Phony Baba’s bhabhoot which he produces out of air and claims that energy can be converted into the matter.
Somewhere all the creations are interconnected. Something which is created now in this moment may have a connection with a creation created 50 or 500 or 5000 years ago and even if the conscious compartment of the mind of creator does not know about the previous creation but that old creation might have influenced him via many other creations.
There is a time and there is a stage when one lives in the world but he ceases to belong to the world. He has passed through the materialistic gains but he is still thirsty inside and no material gain gives him a permanent kind of satisfaction. Before that emptiness is born inside it is useless to go for a spiritual journey. If one goes there without overcoming the worldly desires then s/he would enter there with a mind, full of unfulfilled desires then he may commit crimes in the places which are created to pursue religious activities. This is happening all over the world and pretentious seekers have been doing heinous crimes inside the four falls and under the high roofs of these so called religious places.
Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.
Gulzar also raises some questions in 7KM, via Rekha Bhardwaj,
Seventh times Susanna finally marries to the Jesus, whose physical presence was already destroyed centuries ago. Susanna is also part of that human race which had killed Jesus and which had killed a Socrates, a Mansoor and many such other saints.
Film rests on an idea, prevailing among all the people who are following any kind of spiritual journey, that ultimate goal of a human being is to attain salvation. And one has to pursue this journey to get Nirvana while he is having the facility of living in a human body.
In East, tradition has been to accept the stories as such and major focus is given to draw the useful conclusions and efforts are not done to analyze why a person did this and that? Nobody has cared for centuries why Valmiki was pursuing a life of a dacoit and a criminal before he became a sage? He also might have killed the people. What matters most in his biography is this only that he left the criminal side of his life, went through the atonement process and pursued a spiritual journey and got the Nirvana and this part of world celebrates his attaining the sage hood. He is known as Maharishi Valmiki. In the story of Angoolimal, his criminal life does not bother the people and what appeals to them is his transformation from a criminal to a spiritual seeker and a person who ultimately got the salvation.
(It w’d be interesting to guess how people w’d have reacted if it was a story showing a man-Shakespeare or Sam, marrying 6 times and killing all of his 6 wives and follows Susanna’s way to spiritualism? Bluebeard w’d not work here as he was killed as killer only and he did not pass through any transformation).
Human history is filled with the examples where criminals, murderers have reached a stage where they c’d not pursue their evil lives any longer and they got a realization that they would have to go through atonement to purify their dirty inner world. This ablution inside rejuvenates their conscience and process of atonement starts removing dirt from their consciousness.
A stage comes when they again become as pure as a child and now they can pursue their spiritual journey.
Susanna commits all kinds of Cardinal Sins. She tries to make physical relationship with Arun, who is almost an adopted son for her. Though this is also a fact that since his childhood Arun also wanted to get Susanna. Susanna not only kills her six husbands but she tries twice to commit suicide. This single step brings a full stop before the potential of a life. If she is caught by the law for killing her husbands and she is given legal punishment, she still has a chance to go through the atonement but if she kills herself then journey of this life is finished. One can catch Susanna while she is still wandering ignorantly inside the labyrinth of Capital Vices and one can still catch her while seeds of awareness are sown inside her consciousness but now she can not be made a prisoner. Now even if she is jailed she would live like a free spirit.
Susanna, whose mother was died soon after giving her the birth, has been raised by her nanny Maggy (Usha Utthup). She is extremely closed to her father and Maggy.
She is born in a christian family. She is unusual and she does not mind playing with poisonous Cobras. Researchers say that snakes don’t drink milk. Hindus adore Nagdevata and celebrate festivals like Nagapanchami. Susanna offers milk to her cobras. It should suggest the viewer that here, in the world of Susanna, superstitions are taken as beliefs.
First marriage was imposed on her by her father. Afterward she chooses to marry twice on her own and rest of the three marriages are again imposed on her by the circumstances. 3 men (Vronsky, Keemat and Dr. Tarafdar) maneuvered her into the marriage, against her wish, to fulfill their own selfish desires.
She was searching for a love in her husbands. She dreamed that she would get a husband who would accept her in her totality as her father had done. She desired for a total acceptance but what she got in return? All of her husbands were controlled by their dark minds. None of her six husbands was a good, normal and loving person in that sense. All of them had a dark side. All of them would victimize women (and men also) in their own manners. She can not live like her true self if she continues living with any of the Rodriques, Jimmy, Vronsky, Keemat and Wasiullah. With Dr. Tarafdar it is just matter of time when he would kill her and go away with her assets.
Except in her forced marriage with keemat (Annu Kapoor), she tries to go along with all her husbands with a full devotion but in every relationship she finds out that she has been duped by these men and she finds it hard to digest that her husbands have played with her total trust and devotion. She becomes a wounded person inside and takes her revenge.
Relevant question is – Is total acceptance of one human being by other human being possible?
One searches for a cold touch and puts his hands in hot water. He is bound to burn his hands.
Scenes in this film create that suitable atmosphere in which events of the story can take place. Vishal Bhardwaj takes care that suitable mood is reflected through scenes of his film. His imagery speaks of the truth envisioned in an imaginary fiction.
There are two scenes in the film, one is a physical fight between Major (Neel Nitin Mukesh), the first husband of Susanna, and Goonga, the jockey of Susanna.
Another scene is an open air mushaira in Kashmir where Wasiullah Khan is reciting his poetry.
Two different sets of experiments, taking care of the parameters – lenses, framing, camera movements, lighting and background music, create two different kinds of atmosphere in the film.
First is filled with excitement and adventure while second creates a serenity all around, though both the scenes deal with some sort of violence.
This is atmospheric cinema in its good form.
Third Chapter, showing the Alphea and Omega of the relationship between Susanna and Wasiullah Khan, is a piece of cinematic brilliance.
It is the most layered chapter among all the 7 chapters. Vishal Bhardwaj in association with cinematographer and technical team, motivates Irrfan Khan and Priyanka Chopra to that level that he has come out with a world class cinema in this chapter. one can not suggest a change or better additions in this chapter. Minute details are there glowing in their full glory. Every thing has been taken care of.
One may not get the full meaning of last stanza (Aakhein kuchh laal see hain….) of the song ‘Bekaran‘ by listening its audio but film reveals the meaning of this stanza.
When camera follows Sultana/Susanna, who is going to the room where Wasiullah Khan is listening Mehdi Hassan, then intensity of the sound of the song is gradually increased with the Sultana’s walking towards Wasiullah. Not many filmmakers of hindi cinema go for such a micro detailing.
In this small film (within 7KM) Irrfan Khan has touched the heights through his brilliant performance. This is his most vulnerable and subtle performance till now. His eyes, his glances, his body language and his speeches, everything exhibits, in an amazing manner, the inner and outer world of Wasiullah Khan.
This chapter should wake Muzaffar Ali up. His Rumi is just living right here in india.
Priyanka Chopra also sincerely matches Irrfan Khan‘s glowing performance.
Lucky are the curious students of hindi cinema who have got cinematic awareness in the first decade of new millennium as they have got a chance to witness the growth of the young filmmakers like Vishal Bhardwaj, Anurag Kashyap, Divakar Banerjee and few other directors of this era. These new age directors are not repeating themselves and each time they make a film, they come up with a new kind of subject and a new kind of film. Hindi cinema is controlled by the Box Office success and it is not easy to churn out a new film every time one gets a chance to direct a film. New efforts demand a lot of energy, courage, passion, study and resources. Not only the qualities but even weaknesses of their films and their mistakes teach a lot to the young aspirants who would like to make films in future.
Not that those who can see the weaknesses in films like 7KM can make a better film than this film. After watching a finished product it becomes quite easy to see its merits and demerits. Moreover for academic purposes it never harms a film if its qualities and weaknesses are given a proper attention. Through this way only students of cinema may get a knowledge and can lead a path of growth.
Film generates a few disagreements with its scheme and its way of presentation.
1) Film’s opening shot shows Susanna pointing a revolver to her head and she fires the pistol and blood splashes to the wall. In the 6th chapter she is sitting across the Dr. Tarafdar (Naseeruddin Shah) and she plays the game of killing and audience get to see who is killed in this game. Film’s last chapter is still remaining so after coming at this point opening of the film looks weak. Film could have shown the scene of church as first scene and then it could have gone into the flashback.
2) Major parts of the film are presented via the narration of Arun and many times there is a conflict of different POVs. It would have been better if film was presented through Director’s POV and not through any character’s POV. Moreover Vivaan Shah‘s narration was not very impressive. Though his debut shows him as a confident actor but for the betterment of film it could have been shown without his narration.
3) Film inserts a real time line by introducing few events happened in India in last 25 years and this scheme actually reduces the impact of the film because film’s nature did not demand a real time reference. Film could have made more impact if it was beyond the real time scale. Moreover chronology does not coincide with the lives of Susanna and Arun. There are two major flaws in this time scale scheme.
(a) When Arun gets a childhood photo of Susanna where she is shown posing with her father and it is mentioned on the photo : ” Daddy, me and our Pondycherry House- 19–”. Year is either 1944 or 1964. If year is 1944 then she is 40 years old when her first husband Major Rodriques loses his leg during Operation Blue Star (1984). She does not look like a 40 years old woman in that segment of her life. She is shown in her early 20s and that makes the year mentioned on the photo as 1964. She could be a 4-5 years old girl in that photo and that settles her year of birth either 1960 or 1959 and this settlement fixes her age at 51 in the year of 2011 and film has advertised that Priyanka Chopra has played a woman in her mid 60s in the 7th chapter of the film. First scheme reduces the impact of first chapter and second scheme reduces the impact of last chapter (unless they extrapolated the life of Susanna and last chapter is fixed in the year of 2026, but that scheme would demand a lot of imagination to show an era that is yet to come).
Actually 1964 fits better because then there was no need to popularize that Priyanka Chopra has played a 64 year old woman in the film. Prosthetic make-up could have handled very well if she was shown in her early 50s. Priyanka Chopra is very good when she and cameraman did not have to fight with her make up. There is an irregularity in her make ups in 6th and 7th chapter. Sometimes she looks quite old and in next scene she looks younger than the previous scene. Her scene with Arun at sea shore in 7th chapter does not show her as a 64 year old woman. Neither her looks nor her voice give that impression.
Director c’d have handled this age issue with little bit more care. Showing Priyanka Chopra in her 50s in 7th chapter would have improved her performance and impact of her performance. She is very good in first 5 chapters of the film and her performance looks bit weaker in the last 2 chapters and her makeup also has a contribution in bringing down the level of her overall performance.
(b) According to Arun’s narration and film’s presentation Susanna marries Vronsky in the year of 1998 when India went for Pokharan II (May 11th & 13th, 1998) and at the same time Arun goes to Russia to study medical science. When he comes back he has got his degree in medical science. After coming back from Russia he leaves Susanna. But when he is traveling in a train a fellow traveler is reading – IC 814 hijack drama over, in a newspaper and here trouble comes because plane was hijacked on December 24th, 1999 and passengers were freed on December 31st, 1999. Arun can not get a medical degree in just 1 year time.
Chronological factor reduces the overall impact of the film. Such stories leave better impact when a real time scale does not interfere with the flow of story.
4) The confession scene in the end. After becoming a nun, Susanna goes to confession box and says- mujhe apane gunaah kubool karane hain, saaton gunaah. This scene does not go well with the nature of this stage of the film. It does not look honest with this stage of life of Susanna. She has passed through the penance. She is shown to dreaming about dancing with Jesus which reflects that her consciousness is clean now. Either one gets purification or s/he is still impure. It makes less sense if she would talk about past phase of her life now at this stage. This scene c’d have made impact if it was fixed somehow before the scene where she is sitting in a bar in front of a giant statue of Buddha and talks to a gentleman (Ruskin Bond). Father is not shown in the confession box and in the bar scene Ruskin Bond is shown wearing a plain suit so nobody c’d have imagined that he is actually a priest and still suspense factor c’d have remained intact. In confession scene Susanna also c’d go in her normal clothes. Confession scene looks more like a gimmick to give audience a thrill.
There are weaknesses in the film. But all these ifs and buts are generated because such a FILM is made in hindi cinema. In spite of its weaknesses it enriches the viewing experience of a curious audience and it teaches a lot to the students of cinema. Viewing the film -> reading the story -> again viewing the film : this scheme reveals a lot of things to the learners of cinema.
7KM teases the film critics and proves that they are found again playing on a wrong field. Many of them reiterates the mantras like Aum Coen Brothersay namah, Aum namah Kieślowski, Aum Namah Lars von Trier and so on and a No Smoking comes and a 7 KM comes and they start showing their unprofessional attitude and incapabilities in accepting new efforts done in hindi cinema. Some one starts searching a David Lincher in Zodiac and Se7en and many of them forget the tehzeeb and keep continuing the silsilay of attacking any good and worthy cinema created in hindi film industry.
Summer comes and goes… same happens with a rainy season…winter also changes the mood on earth but it goes away…and then spring comes… but it also goes and this whole cycle of changes becomes a constant phenomenon.
When its philosophical use is shown on screen, it’s celebrated but only when it’s done in a foreign language.
Aum Kim Ki-dukay Namah
When such efforts are tried in any Indian language then they are not good films at all!
Chala Murari Hero banane!
Time and again majority of Indian film critics (paid) have proved that it is ’99′ percent sure that they are not into this profession because they love the cinema but they are here just for the sake of doing a job and their attitude is this only that they are bigger than any film made in hindi cinema and it does not matter if the film is made by a Vishal Bhardwaj or a Shyam Benegal or a Mani Kaul, they would not give a fair trial to understand the film in its right context before trashing it away. There are critics who are ignorant of the existence of Avimaraka (Bhasa) and Padmavat (Malik Muhammad Jayasi) and they call The Cloud Door of Mani Kaul a porn film. Criticism demands a total understanding of the subject.
‘Hum Nahin Sudhrenge‘ is their most favourite slogan and they would go on spoiling the ‘Fiza’ of Indian cinema.
For lovers and students of cinema 7KM offers a lot. While keeping an eye on its weaknesses they still have enough reasons to celebrate that such a film is made in hindi cinema.
An article on 7KM in Hindi : 7 Khoon Maaf : Parables of Susanna via Metaphysicians Ruskin-Vishal
An article about music of 7KM : 7 खून माफ : डार्लिंग आँखों से आँखें चार करने दो
[...] An article in english :7 Khoon Maaf : Catch her if you can [...]
[...] An article in english :7 Khoon Maaf : Catch her if you can [...]