Guiana 1838

Guiana 1838 tells the story of East Indian immigrants who were brought to the British West Indies to save a faltering sugar industry after the emancipation of slavery. The film presents the social issues which the immigrants encountered, among these are the relationships with white planters and African slaves. The writers have crafted the film in such a way that it supports the theory that East Indian immigration was indeed "A New System of Slavery." I applaud the film for making the Caribbean experience the subject of the drama and going beyond using the Caribbean landscape as a backdrop for some romantic escapade (this has been the case too often of films about the Caribbean). However, I left the cinema without the catharsis which, with a little more work, this drama could have achieved. This, I attribute to the lack of character development of the key East Indian migrants in the film. Some more details and visuals on the lives of the individuals before coming to Guiana would have helped the audience to identify more with the characters.

If you like historical drama and interested in the story of dispossessed peoples ...check it out.