Rafi is a street photographer,
who snaps tourists at the
Gateway to India, Mumbai’s
most visited attraction. One
day, when he has taken a pic
of a young woman, given her
the print, turned to get an
envelope – he finds she’s gone.
Rafi, about 30, but tanned and
lined from being in the sun all
day, is under pressure from
his Dadi – his gran – to get
married. He sends her a copy
of the pic, pretending the
woman is his fiancée.
But Dadi’s so pleased she
decides to travel from her
village to meet the girl. She
turns out to be a middle-class
accountancy student, Miloni,
whose image appears on a
poster around the city adver-
tising her college. Rafi tracks
her down and asks her to
pretend to be his girlfriend for
the meeting with his Dadi. She
does. And she agrees to meet
again next day.
This may sound like apainful and obvious Holly-
wood fairy story. Batra’s film
is anything but, exploring
class in India, and poignant
about aspirations.
Rafi lives in a wooden hut,
entered through a trap door
in the floor, and shared with
half a dozen other men – pho-
tographers and taxi drivers.
Miloni is hardworking but
unhappy, and pushed by her
competitive parents to meet
young men with prospects.
Not the likes of Rafi, who,
like their servant, sleeps on a
bedroll on the floor.
Will Rafi and Miloni get
together? A lovely gentle,
understated film, it asks if, in
today’s India, two people from
such different backgrounds
can truly be friends. MLWhen Jill gets home from
school at the end of the day,
she’s dismayed to see a grand
cream cake on the table –
her birthday is not until the
weekend. She hides it from
her little brother Bo so that he
doesn’t realize their mum’s got
it wrong. Astrid, their mum, is
still in bed. She’s depressive,
and drinks.
It’s Jill, though, who has it
wrong. When Astrid emerges,
she has a candle for the cake- it’s to celebrate her new job.
Or rather, we soon learn, an
interview for a job running art
workshops that she’s assured
of getting if she turns up for
the Friday morning inter-
view that a friend has set up.
It sparks Astrid, an artist who
once had some success, into
frenetic activity, painting in
her basement studio, pulling
in and exciting Jill and Bo.
It’s a big week for Jill. On the
Saturday, her birthday, she
and Bo will be seeing their
dad, a jazz musician living in
Sweden who’ll be back in Oslo
to play a gig.
Henriksen’s debut feature is
tragic, desperate and compel-
ling, but offers some hope. It’s
partly about parents who are
sucked into the self-centred
myth of the glorious artist
and the supreme value of art.
But its main focus is a child,
mature beyond her years,
whose sensitivity and protec-
tiveness shine out and lead her
into deceit. Yet she feels her
way to speaking truthfully. As
does her trumpeting father,
who is finally able to be honest
to his children about his life.
Phoenix is a film that’s hard to
forget. MLPhoenix
directed and written by Camilla Strøm Henriksen
86 minutes
++++,Photograph
directed and written by Ritesh Batra
110 minutes
++++,FILM
MIXED MEDIA78 NEW INTERNATIONALIST