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  • Mehta risks fury with film

    The Toronto Star
    May 11, 2005 Wednesday

    Mehta risks fury with film

    Prithi Yelaja, Toronto Star

    Like many Canadians, Deepa Mehta has a foot in two cultures.

    What sets the award-winning filmmaker apart is her ability to
    translate that bicultural reality into art - often risking fury, as
    well as stimulating awareness, in both Canada and India.

    It happened with Water, a film she just finished, which explores the
    plight of India's widows: Two days into shooting, Hindu
    fundamentalist protestors destroyed the movie's sets, forcing her to
    move the production from the Indian holy city of Varanasi to Sri
    Lanka.

    And it might happen again with her next project, a documentary about
    immigrant women and domestic abuse - still a taboo subject in some
    newcomer communities - which begins shooting in Toronto next week.

    Mehta spent yesterday in Brampton doing interviews with two women for
    the documentary. The multicultural ensemble involved in the project -
    the producer is Argentine, the co-producer Indian and the chief
    photographer Armenian - "reflects on what Canada is today, which is
    great," she says.

    "Canada is really changing," says Mehta, 52. As part of Asian
    Heritage Month, Mehta will be giving a free public lecture at the
    University of Toronto on the the impact of South Asian Canadians on
    the film industry.

    "When I came here (in 1973), we were visible minorities. Now
    everybody's a visible minority and there's a realization that
    Canadians aren't just white.

    "If you are from a different culture ... your stories are obviously
    going to be different, but they have just as much value as anybody
    else's, which is what is so exciting," she says.

    "I feel Toronto is home as much as Delhi is."

    A trailer from Water, set for release in November, will be shown
    tonight. The film is the last in a trilogy that includes Fire (1996)
    and Earth (1998).

    Fire, about lesbian lovers, sparked riots in India and was
    temporarily pulled by censors. Earth, which told the story of the
    partition of India and Pakistan in 1947 from a child's point of view,
    prompted one well-known Indian actor to label it "melodramatic."

    Water, which is set in 1938, sparked the most violently negative
    reaction. In February 2000, mobs stormed the set, shutting down
    production. Shooting resumed only last year, with a new cast. The
    original actors were busy or, in the case of the child protagonist,
    had simply grown up.

    Mehta says she does not set out to make controversial films, but
    rather to explore the place of women in society, "whether it's during
    war, or making (sexual) choices that are not condoned by society or
    ... living by the dictates of religious mores."

    And she shrugs off criticism. "With Fire, there were people who felt
    lesbians don't exist in India - in fact, there is no word for a
    lesbian in Hindi. With Earth, (the criticism stemmed from) how dare
    I, as an NRI (non-resident Indian), talk about something that isn't
    mine," says Mehta.

    Water - so named because the film is set in the widow houses (ashrams
    for widows) on the banks of the Ganges River - coincided with the
    rise of Hindu fundamentalism five years ago.

    The movie "is not an attack on Hinduism," she said.

    "But anything that questioned or looked at something that was Hindu
    with some skepticism had to be damned."

    Many of India's 34 million widows are still forced to live by archaic
    religious edicts, she says.

    "A Hindu woman is considered to be her husband's half-body when he's
    alive, and when he's dead she's considered to be half dead, too ...
    They really are relegated to be the pariahs of society."

    Sati, the practice of a widow voluntarily or forcibly being burned
    alive on her husband's funeral pyre, for example, was banned in 1829,
    but endures in some rural areas.

    It's still frowned upon for widows, no matter how young, to remarry.
    Widows are not allowed to take prominent roles in auspicious
    ceremonies - at weddings, for example - because they're considered to
    bring bad luck. The practice of requiring widows to shave their heads
    and dress in white also persists, though these attitudes are
    changing.

    Mehta speaks tonight at 7 at the Koffler Institute, 569 Spadina Ave.
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