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Can cinema influence politics? |
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| Can cinema influence politics? |
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 Reading about Merry Christmas, I felt the timing of this soon to release movie was ideal not just for the upcoming festivities but for a more important element in the movie - one which has generated diverse and passionate opinions over this sensitive issue in India.
It has been more than three weeks since the gruesome terror attacks jolted the city of Mumbai and its spirit.
Since then, several peace marches, protests, prayers, rallies have been held. Cricket tours have been put on hold, cultural exchanges have been stalled. Accusations, resignations, re-shuffles, and everything else but a clear point-wise solution has surfaced.
While politicians accuse one another and debate whether to bomb our neighboring country, let’s roll the clock back to the previous century to an incident which happened during the First World War as shown in the movie, ‘ Merry Christmas ‘.
December 1914 - the bloodiest war at that time in human history is under way. An exceptional German tenor gives up his prestigious career to enlist as a soldier.
An Anglican priest, volunteers along with his young church aide leave Scotland, one as a soldier, the other as a stretcher-bearer. A French Lieutenant leaves his wife, pregnant and bedridden, to fight the enemy. Christmas arrives, with its snow and multitude of family and army presents. But the surprise doesn’t come from inside the generous parcels which lie in the French, Scottish and German trenches.
A momentous event changes the destinies of these soldiers as they find themselves at the heart of the unprecedented fraternisations between German, British and French troops.
Soprano Anna, the wife of the German tenor succeeds in convincing the Prussian Prince to join her husband and sing for the German high command. He brings her to the front line to sing for his comrades in the trenches. The Scottish and the French Lieutenant have an informal and unauthorised meeting with the German Lieutenant and negotiate a truce for one night. Father Palmer celebrates a mass for the soldiers.
French, German and English soldiers, in the midst of fighting a war, lay down their arms for one night and fraternise with their enemies, much to the displeasure of their superiors.
Rifles are left at the bottom of the trenches; borders are crossed to shake hands, exchange a cigarette or a piece  f chocolate, and wish each other “Merry Christmas”. Front-line soldiers peacefully meet each other in No Man's Land to share a precious pause in the carnage with a fleeting brotherhood.
The film which was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year at the Academy Awards in 2006 shows the futility of war through the plight of the soldiers who know that they are celebrating one night but will go back to killing one another the next. It serves as a grim reminder of the human cost of war.
Let me make it clear that I am not at all suggesting sharing chocolates and cigars with our “neighbors” on the battle-field. What I am rather hoping for is that passionate solutions don’t take precedence over more rationale but strong measures to deal with these atrocities. Probably in this case, let us allow cinema to validate the futility of war. Let’s not rush to the terror sites and do a recee for a movie which we wish to make… |
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