A story which is told more due to the need of it being told than a director’s fantasy to tell such a story, a cinema where the frames speak more than the words and performances that are as accurate as life itself could be in those moments, that’s how I define “I am”. The poignancy with which every piece is told is beautiful.
My favorite of all stories remains I am Megha, the story of Kashmiri plight with Juhee and Manisha in it. It’s terribly disturbing when Megha visits her uncle’s ruined house. The crazy part is, one can’t take sides in this story, because this is one fight, where everyone involved has only lost. When Rubina responds – Is Jannat me jeene ki saza se – on being asked what problem she has, I realize being uprooted from your home is painful, but what is more painful is living in the hell that your home has been turned into, each day, each moment. Probably I am going back to the same premise as my last writing (My Home, My way), but I think it’s an important question for all of us to ask again and again, “Why? Why they?”
The piece, “I am Abhimanyu”, is another very important one. This subject of Child sexual abuse needs more discussion in public domain. This is one area that is mostly shoved under the carpet, in Indian homes. In a survey conducted by government of India, it was found that 53.22% of children being surveyed were sexually abused, out of which 52.9% were boys, a number way higher than the girls (Source –Study on Child Abuse, India 2007 by Ministry of Women and Child Development, Govt. of India. More details are also available on Wikipedia). It is important that we build an atmosphere of confidence in our homes so that children can report such issues at least to someone.
The other stories were also well made. However, both Afia and Omar probably could have had gone more in-depth to the subjects they were based on. The other glitch, to me, was loose interweavements of the four pieces. However, I am not very sure if that was any significant objective the movie was developed with. So for that I don’t blame it for not delivering it in this area. It was truly really delight to watch some of my favorite actors in the movie.
Watch out people, before it is out of theatres.
Well put Rohit!!…I too loved watching some of our favourite actors…..the message is actually well conveyed but could not decipher the connect between the stories …. but overall a very good attempt….