The Dance of Shiva

The Dance of Shiva is an amazing film. Amazing because it tells a story that has been all but forgotten, amazing because of the array of talent gathered to tell that story and even more amazing because all this was pulled off by a director in his twenties, making pretty much his first film. The story is that of the sacrifices made by soldiers from the Indian sub-continent while fighting on the western front during World War One, and the prejudice they encountered while they served. To tell this story the director, Jamie Payne, has gathered together some of the biggest names of cinema both past and present. In front of the camera you can see Kenneth Branagh, Paul McGann, Sam West, Julian Glover and in a pivotal role Sanjeev Bhasker. They are joined behind the camera by Oscar winners cinematographer Jack Cardiff and production designer John Box. Jamie Payne has teamed them with a hole host of young talent and created what will, I believe, be viewed in retrospect as the film world's first look at a huge talent that can only grow and move onto bigger and even better things.

Here's the great thing about Dance of Shiva, now that I've watched it. If you start painting all your fingernails and toenails during the opening sequences, they will be completely dry when the movie ends. The movie ends neither too soon, which would leave them still tacky when you got up to turn it off, nor does it run long enough to disqualify it as a good excuse to sit down and paint your nails and let them dry thoroughly before starting in on any other projects.

Briefly, because there's really no other way to discuss it, this short film attempts to tell something about the heroism shown by a troop of Bengal Lancers under British command during WWI, and by Bengal, I mean they are Bengali, from India. Paul McGann plays a chaplain who is trying to reconcile his mission as a promoter of the Christian faith with the very laudable goal of trying to respect the Hindu religious beliefs and philosophy which unify his Bengal unit and are the source of their courage and strength. Shiva dances the dance of life and death, entertwined, you see, so one feeds upon the other, and there is no reason to be afraid of either. The British don't see it quite the same way, of course, and so Sam West eventually shows up in the arrogant twit Aryan bigot role to throw up on his boots when confronted with the grim realities of trench warfare. But really, there's not any actual plot--as such.

Samuel West has hardly any lines in this movie, which is sort of a crime when you consider the folly of hiring one of the most golden-throated actors in all of England to be in your short flick, and then not giving him much more to say other than..."Ooof....urp.....glgugggggghhhrrggg....<splat>". Not cool. However, those of you who felt that his syphilitic seizures in "The Ripper" compared unfavorably to Jamie Bamber's epileptic fits in the role of Horatio Hornblower's "Archie Kennedy" (which they did) will be greatly reassured by the the realistic portrayal of shivering and puking and attempting to keep from puking in Shiva. I suppose it's simply a matter of matching the sudden-onset, uncontrollable, publicly-disturbing, involuntary manifestation of a medical problem to the actor. In Mr. West's case, the barfing and shivering thing was really working well for him.

Horatio Hornblower's Faithful Lt. Bush, Paul McGann, looks great in a priestly collar, but less well in a WWI-era helmet than he does in a bicorn. The timbre of his husky voice is mostly wasted, but he has the opportunity to display that long, beautiful, austere face in a variety of concerned and thoughtful moments of observation, reflection, and compassion. Screencappers, start your engines.

There's a neat little association here for the Potter movie fans. Branagh (bearded) has a few lines in the beginning, which he delivers with characteristic gusto, and then later on, a guy named Julian Glover shows up. Glover was the voice of Aragog the giant spider in Chamber of Secrets, and of course, Branagh was Gilderoy Lockhart.

La, what strange bedfellows these obscure British art-house flicks make.

Visually and acoustically stunning: it reminds us of a golden age of British cinema and shows us that there is plenty of hope for another in the near future. Its strong anti-racist theme and argument for a wider multicultural understanding make it a very timely statement at the end of this century. This young director's remarkable achievement is clearly generating considerable envy among lesser talents. However the rest of us are eagerly looking forward to whatever he does next.

In the trenches of World War I, Chaplin Greville is placed in charge of the religious services for a unit that has English officers and Hindu soldiers serving together. He is initially unsure of how the men will work together - in particular how he can meet the religious needs of a group of savages who don't even know about God. However, in the trenches he is forced to see past his assumptions.

I was quite excited to see this as I had missed it a few years ago at a festival screening. The cast list alone was enough to draw my attention to it. I watched it a week or so ago when it was screened on television and I must admit that I was rather let down by it. The main failing is in the plot, it is not as interesting as the subject matter suggests it should be. The plot concentrates on the English more than the Hindus and this takes away from the supposed focus. It really should have done more to show one incident of sacrifice rather than trying to present a fuller picture in a short running time.

Aside from the specifics I found it annoying that the film simplified the history to make a film that seeks to apologise for the bad treatment that no one questions was dished out - however things did not happen like this. The Hindu soldiers deserve their story to be told, but they deserve a better film than this to do it. This main weakness makes the rest of the film even more wasteful - for the actual production is very good.

The cast is pretty good and features an early (and rare straight) role for Sanjeev Bhaskar, who does pretty well. The rest of the cast has quite a few big names in it (for a short) but they are not very well used. Branagh and McGann are both good actors but they have little to do. The production values of the film are also very high with a very realistic sense of time and place. The fact that this effort was put into a story that doesn't engage, doesn't resemble what really happened and is far too apologetic in nature rather than just letting the facts speak for themselves.

Overall, I am always willing to give any short film a try - whether it be student animation or an all star production, however this really needed more than a name cast and expensive production to draw me in. The history behind this story is far too interesting to be delivered in a manner such as this. I rarely say this about a short film, never mind a short film that had so much effort put in, but this film is not worth watching which is a shame because the production is good, the cast impressive and the actual story very worthy.

I saw The Dance of Shiva at the Edinburgh International Film Festival: FAR OUT! As an American in Edinburgh I am glad to see some UK film makers haven't lost their touch. An important subject, a lavish production, definitely Lean cuisine. More please.