Gandhi

Rating:
Summary: Perfect, just perfect
Review: After Gandhi was assassinated, the writer of his obituary in one of the major American newsmagazines lamented the distortions that were sure to follow. "The prettifiers", as he called them, would efface all the complexity out of Gandhi's life, and turn him into a plaster lawn saint. This film, the fruition of Richard Attenborough's decades-long ambition, is indeed a hagiography, but the Gandhi that emerges is certainly no plaster saint. Ben Kingsley's character develops from outraged citizen of the Empire to non-violent independence activist to the supra-national spiritual sage we think we know and revere.

As in any historical or biographical epic, events are telescoped, implied, or omitted. The closest to dishonesty the film comes is the scene where Gandhi considerately declines to launch protests against the British during the Second World War. In reality, the "Quit India" campaign was launched in 1942, resulting in the immediate arrest of almost the entire Congress leadership. Otherwise, the events are deftly and fairly-enough portrayed. The rift between Nehru and Sardar Patel is implied with an impatient nod. Gandhi's growing political skill is noted by a _sotto voce_ compliment. And so forth.

The big scenes are very big indeed. The Amritsar massacre is the most chilling such movie scene I've ever witnessed. The first riot scene, between the two columns of pathetic refugees, is all the more wrenching because the viewer cannot tell which are Hindu and which are Muslim--a cinematic comment on religious violence.

Everything about the production of the film is great. The lighting is warm and golden outside, with rich earthtones inside. The editing is especially dramatic: the din of the Amritsar massacre cuts abruptly to the grim silence of General Dyer's courtmartial; the peaceful evening sounds of Kasturbai's deathbed are shattered by the engines of Mountbatten's arriving plane. The costumes and ambience for each era are letter-perfect and absorbing, respectively.

Forgive the cliche, but _Gandhi_ is a triumph of the film-maker's art, as Attenborough displays all his chops in paying this loving tribute to the Mahatma. A master's masterpiece, if there ever was one.

Rating:
Summary: It DOES open with apologies for omissions & misportrayals!
Review: ...I have perused Gandhi's autobiography and, if we give him credit, he WAS an unusually good little boy, and young man. Pretty ignorant otherwise of his life story, I came to the movie as much of a "blank slate" as could be wished...

I thought the development of his character WAS evident, his initial protests based more on principle, and faith in the British legal system, than heartfelt compassion. I also thought the breach between Indian Muslims and Hindus was also faithfully, if briefly, delineated. The film makes it clear, too, that while many Britons were decent and humane, many others were mindless automata blindly serving a system whose humanity they refused to question. I was reminded, particularly after the ghastly massacre of over a thousand non-violently protesting Indians by the British, of the Holocaust. Would Britons have complied had a similar program been initiated in India? One wonders...

The storyline proper starts with Gandhi the lawyer being called "Sammy", and thrown off a train, arriving in South Africa. From here, he decides to campaign against what he considers to be manifest injustice, drawn more and more into the limelight of international notoriety. Gandhi understood that, at root, the British system was INTENDED to be just and that, with the aid of the international press, he could successfully wage a campaign of aggressive passive resistance.

I found it highly amusing as the film went on as this sort of phrase started to become well-worn: "Arrest everyone, but NOT Gandhi!". A great film.

Rating:
Summary: Good - but do some history homework first
Review: I like this film in some ways, but there are historical inaccuracies. First, someone mentioned that Kingsley is Indian. This is only partly true, because he is only a quarter Indian. So, there is something to the argument of "why couldnt they find a real Indian Actor?" I think its a fair question.

second - Nehru is seen as defering to Ghandi throughout the film. This is a false portrayal. Nehru had his own fiercly held independent beliefs, and although the two men were friends, they had serious differences over the Mother Cow laws, to name just one example. Nehru was more influenced by Moghul and English culture, and held on to that. Hr even once said that he was probably the last Englishman to rule India. And he never deferred to Gandhi.

Also - this portrayal of Ghandi the saint. In real life, he was complicated. But I guess we are asking too much sometimes when we want film to portray people as morally complicated. The truth is he probably wasnt a very good father. His children hated him. One of them became a muslim because he hated his father so much, and later an alcoholic.

There is much more to this man than meets the eye. So, do yourself a favor. Use this film not as your sole source of knowing about this period of history. After all, you shouldnt rely on film as your only source of understanding history. If you do, your never really going to know anything. So, do yourself a favor and read a few books as well, and you will not have a one-dimensional understanding of history. If you rely on only this film, you remain uninformed.

Rating:
Summary: My Vote For The Best Fim Biography Ever Made!
Review: This movie was the realization of a lifetime dream for Sir Richard Attenborough, who finally succeeded in bringing this incredible spectacular to theatrical release in 1982. I was living outside London working for the American Forces in the greater London area at the time, so was thrilled to have the privilege to see this movie in its limited initial release in Britain, and was amazed by its scope, accuracy and integrity in bringing the quite controversial facts surrounding Gandhi's life and politically-motivated assassination to the screen. Ben Kingsley is simply magnificent as the diminutive, principled, and indefatiguable lawyer, humanitarian, and citizen of the world with an uncannily prescient feel for what was possible for a determined and energetic person as well as how to achieve his lofty otherworldly goals right here on earth.

Based on his appraoch here, Attenborough seems to have learned much from such masterful British film-makers as David Lean, for the use of scenery, topography, and natural surrounding of the characters as they wind through the more than 40 years of story line is breath-taking. His methods owe much to the kind of subtle insinuation of the local environment David Lean in particular used so memorably in movies like "Bridge Over The River Kwai" and "Lawrence of Arabia" (see my reviews) in making the scenery more than an incidental player in the storyline. Seeing Gandhi immersed in the incredible multidimensional diversities that were (and are) India helps the viewer as we begin to understand just how incredible his efforts were to unite the country with his strange yet irresistible moral authority, an authority that all of the various factions recognized and respected as the authentic thing.

There is, of course, an immensely talented cast, including Martin Sheen as an American newspaper correspondent who becomes intrigued by Gandhi's profound and surprisingly effective non-violent approach to social change. Gandhi's approach to using reason and morality to approach issues and perspectives, and these methods become the real star of the film as it builds slowly over the scope of this very literate and intelligent script. This is a wonderful motion picture experience for anyone willing to sit through the more than three hour extravaganza, one that guarantees Attenborough's prominent place in film history, and one that leaves this reviewer smacking his lips in anticipation of whatever other wonderful effort such as this may someday appear based on Attenborough's talents, visions, and moral sensibilities. Enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome
Review: The movie depicts reality quite well. There is a misconception that Ben Kingsley is a British actor. He is an Indian, his real name being Krishna Bhanji, and has merely Anglicized his name. Inspite being too long, the movie holds your attention. Those wishing to see more of the Mahatma see the movies - "Making of the Mahatma" - where he is depicted more as a human, than as a saint and also the movie "Sardar" , about Vallabh Patel.

Rating:
Summary: Great film
Review: "Gandhi" is both moving and historically accurate. No ifs, ands, or buts.

Rating:
Summary: An update of "The Emporer's New Clothes"
Review: The more I think about the injustices of the British, the more disturbed I feel. I'm referring to the modern British movie makers, not the Victorian imperialists. I understand that it's considered something of a sacrilege to say anything negative about this movie, given the piles of awards and volumes of praise it has received, but then sometimes it's one's moral duty to be sacreligious.

The film "Gandhi" shows a lack of imagination--I don't mean the type of imagination that creates fantasies, but the type that can create a plausible reality. From the earliest scenes, the film makers present Gandhi as a saint in full bloom. We see nothing of his develpment as a person--or as a saint, for that matter, except that he grows older during the movie. He is a plastic, glow-in-the-dark dashboard ornament who displays no worse behavior (during his ENTIRE LIFE, we are supposed to believe) than a few moments of mild anger at his wife, behavior that is immediately mellowed by the romantically misty photography and a soulful look or two from the protagonists. (Gandhi and his wife--now THAT would have been a movie!)

The baddies in the film are every bit as perfect (i.e., stereotyped) in their way as the good guys. Get a load of the leering Simon Legree who seems to be masterminding the assassination, for example. I wonder that the director refrained from having the actor twirl his moustaches as he nodded encouragement to the assassin.

Even India looks phony, as if the whole thing were filmed in Beverly Hills. The bits of carefully applied blood and dirt that are shown are reminiscent of the plastic lepers in "Papillon" or Jeffrey Hunter's shaved armpits in the crucifixion scene of "King of Kings." I'm not asking for hair or dirt or sloppy human emotions because I especially like to see those things. It's just that there's something spiritually twisted--dirty, even--about so carefully sanitizing this story.

The movie makers couldn't even let an Indian play the main role. They must have figured that no audience would sit still to watch a big-eared, hook-nosed, scrawny little brown man for three and a half hours. If true, this says something about the movie makers' faith in their subject. In fact, Gandhi in his photos looks interesting; Mr. Kingsley as Gandhi looks like Mr. Kingsley made up to look like Gandhi. Maybe having an Englishman play the role was England's way of rewriting history to show that She (England) wasn't so bad after all? Sure: Gandhi was at heart just a fine English gentleman, an elegantly handsome English gentleman who shaved and painted his head, rouged his cheeks and powdered his very carefully coiffed moustache. (Maybe Mr. K is an Indian, or part Indian. I don't know. But the point is that he is an actor who needs to be made up to look like an Indian.) One begins to think that such movies are made by blind people, for blind people. And one is reminded of the emporer's new clothes. Do movie makers suppose that audiences can't SEE make-up? Are movie makers that sure of the corruption of our senses as they clearly are of the corruption of our sensibilities?

Why won't movie makers (and other Sunday school teachers) give us a holy man who is also a person? (Well, okay, Pasolini tried once.) If goodness is finally unattainable by mere mortals, then what IS the point of the Gandhi story, or the Jesus story, or any story? If these figures were perfectly detached and ethereal beings, if they had to be worshipped, then they have nothing to do with our real lives on this planet. We might as well go on worshipping Mammon.

It is not a totally bad movie. The truths of Gandhi's actions, of his "beliefs" did shine through the triteness. (But again, if those truths were not in each of us before the movie started, and if holy men are not men, our existence is indeed a sorry joke.) And I did enjoy for a while the scene in which Gandhi first meets with the other Indian leaders. They looked and acted like a bunch of dessicated old queens who had run out of ways to be decadent. At last, I thought, we get some individual detail, some quirky personality. But wouldn't you guess that Gandhi would have them whipped into moral rectitude by the end of the scene?

Maybe we will remember and re-view this movie in much the same spirit that we now watch such past "epic achievements" as "The Ten Commandments," "Ben-Hur" or "King of Kings"--as corny, hackneyed, kitschy spectacles with ocassional flashes of real talent. Maybe not quite: "Gandhi" is a better movie than those. The acting is better. The photography and direction are better. It is well put together: an exciting Hollywood adventure story (even if not made in Hollywood).

Ronald Reagan once said, "Film is forever." If he had been telling the truth (try imagining THAT), he might have said instead, "Hollywood is everywhere." No, thank God (or whatever), film is not forever. It is a transparent, brittle, easily distorted and destroyed medium. It is also by far the most fragile--and the crudest--of art forms. It should be, has to be, handled with care. If nothing else, "Gandhi" proves semanticists wrong: perfection is relative. The movie "Gandhi" is made imperfect by its failure to portray imperfections.

Rating:
Summary: "I'm not sorry at all"
Review: I'm not sorry at all I seen this movie its Brilliant.The nostalgic vibe this film gave to me was incredible it was amazing.The whole sense of Gandhi trying to unite Hindu,Muslim and Sikh was as real then as it is now.

Rating:
Summary: One of the best movies i've ever seen
Review: This is a telling of the late passive-resistance Indian man known as Gandhi. The movie tells a good story of his life, in the time allotted. I was disapointed how the ending was given right away, leaving no surprise to those who know not about his life, however it would have had to go on further had the ending stopped at his death without telling you first about it. A fine movie. Watch it, it will make you question your ways just as Gandhi made the British question theirs many years ago.

Rating:
Summary: Most beatiful song of peace
Review: Ghandi, is the very important pace-man of the century, and the movie is the great tribute of hard labour of a little-big man. Thank por make a film about this. thank again.