Mr. and Mrs. Iyer

We often hear and indeed experience that not just the story but how it is presented makes a book or play or film really great. Of course, double that when the story is great in the first place.

So, here is a story – a Muslim guy and a Hindu gal meet in an unlikely happenstance and most unpredictabley for either one, she ends up saving his life. Can be presented in multiple different ways – a didactic ‘milk of human kindness’ story, a sentimental tear-jerker of ‘lovers destined to be separated by their religions’, a propagandist patriotic story (India-Pakistan sarhad type), a romatic romping around (erstwhile) beautiful Kashmir gardens feel-good story, and on and on … Well, how about a very down to earth, very believable story, with no syrupy ending and no messages – presented in a way, that it becomes absolute poetry on screen. The handling is what sets the legendary directors apart – like the feat achieved by Aparna Sen in “Mr and Mrs Iyer”.

So, she adds more flesh to the skeleton of the plot. The Muslim guy is a young, carefree unmarried wildlife photographer Raja; and the Hindu gal is Mrs. Meenakshi Iyer – a young wife, a mother, raised very orthodox and cocooned in her old fashioned family’s loving shelter. Each is most unlikely to ever meet the other in their routine lives… except maybe as co-passengers on a long bus journey. He is unwittingly requested to be her chaperon as she is travelling alone with her toddler – a request that may not have been made if his nickname had not masked his religion. So, he is supposed to help protect this single fragile lady with a baby. As the religious riots erupt unexpectedly along the bus route, it is she who ends up protecting him from the Hindu zealots, having just learnt herself that he is Muslim to her shock, by simply saying they are “Mr and Mrs Iyer”.

Luckily, the movie doesn’t end there – it goes further on to show the evolution in Meenakshi’s perspective, in a very subtle way. Unlike the mainstream Hindi films, the perspective is not about her awakening to the brotherhood of religions or any sloganeering. Her saving him is an important, but small, twist in the whole story. Her awakening from her hidebound traditional evaluations of people and life is the more interesting other part of the story. Here is someone that cant break free of the cocoon, but does wake up to the dreams of possibility of a butterfly. “Mr. and Mrs. Iyer” is just the laconic phrase she uses in saving his life; but the movie explores the reality of what they are not as well as the slender fantasies of what could be, what if they were truly… I found the title tantalizing on multiple levels…

A lot has been said about the portrayal by Konkana Sen – a Bengali - of a Tamil Brahmin, her ‘Southern’ accent ‘and all’. I thought she deserved every inch of the praise for her acting; but for the ‘Tamil Brahmin’ part I thought a good deal of credit goes to the makeup artist. Konkana showed the perfect Indian middle class woman’s mannerisms, hand gestures, verbal cues and much more. As great as her acting was throughout the film, she was just outstanding in some scenes with Rahul Bose. One is when he is describing how they met and fell in love – a complete fiction – to the teenagers from the bus. There was a gradual rainbow of emotions going from shock at his figment, amusement, a very misty wistfulness, a longing for the type of life she never had or imagined and would not be possible any more, a feeling of what-could-have-been… That whole scene, enacted brilliantly by both is to me a highlight of the film. The other scene is on the last train journey, when he is describing how he will resume his work… This was Rahul Bose’s scene… very fleetingly longing for a companion. Any potential romance is only subtly hinted at – particularly in the very last scene. The director is almost teasing us about what mainstream cinema may have done, when she shows Rahul Bose pausing and turning back for a moment on the last platform scene.

But more than any one artist, I am far more impressed with Aparna Sen. Almost every scene in the movie feels real; the only part kind of like mainstream Hindi films is that these two alone get a mansion to stay in while all their co-passengers are roughing it out during the riots. Wish she had handled it differently. Of course, even that one stretch of imagination, she used very well – notice those scenes where Raja is taking pictures… scenes in the balconey… we know this is far-fetched, but we want it to be true… The locales, the colors, the acting… everything is just natural. So is the background music!

A long time ago (prehistoric… before the VCR and DVD and BlueRay days) I had read a beautiful review by Vijay Tendulkar ending in ‘a great film is something you want to carry home and keep forever’… Today, I own a DVD of Mr and Mrs Iyer… but it is not enough, I carry it in my heart forever… much closer, and feel warmer for it.