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Love is a Spirit ✨ A Watchlist

The transfixing power of Love

As on my Substack : https://starsfromanothersky.substack.com/p/love-is-a-spirit-a-watchlist

“I have crossed oceans of time to find you.”

This phrase from Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula, a line of profound resonance which the Count says to Mina Harker, always lingers in my mind. It’s like this dark, beautiful whisper uttered by a creature of the shadows, ancient and worn by the cruel passages of centuries, his declaration of love seems kind of heartbreaking.

Dracula’s story is like a dark, gorgeous heartbreak fest. A 15th century prince comes home from war to find that his soulmate has jumped to her death after mistaking him to be dead at the battlefield. Shattered, he renounces everything— his faith, his kingdom, even his humanity, embracing an undead existence, driven by this all consuming love. Centuries unfold, and a young lawyer, Jonathan Harker turns up at Dracula's castle to finalise a land deal. The Count sees a photo of Harker's fiancée, Mina, who looks just like his dead beloved. He imprisons Harker and sets off for London to get his lost love back, someone he believed to be lost forever.

What’s wild about this tale is that Count Dracula was willing to put up with centuries of loneliness all for the remote possibility of being reunited with his dead beloved.

This kind of wicked romance, this slow-seductive longing, a spectral lover waiting for their soulmate to come back, the idea of past lives and reincarnation is a big part of Indian storytelling. There are numerous films that have placed this concept right at the heart of the story. Oddly enough, these films rarely get labeled “horror” or “horror-romance” like Dracula does. They are regarded as just straight-up dramas, where this idea of someone being haunted by a centuries-old romance feels not spooky or creepy but something mystical.

The whole “reincarnation-past-lives” movies in Indian cinema has its roots in Bombay Gothic, or Indian Gothic, a cinematic moment that, as scholars have noted, is our own twisted take on the Western Gothic. Vijay Mishra, who’s a Professor at Murdoch University, Australia, digs into this in his book, Bollywood Cinema: Temples of Desire. He says that while the Indian Gothic shares the same moody, morbid feels of the Western one, the Indian variant is tuned to a better frequency, it’s like, uniquely Indian. He observes that,

Like its complex literary antecedent- the gothic novel- the Indian gothic draws upon the discourses of melodrama and sentimentality. To these we need to add Indian aesthetic theories of the wonderful, the horrific, and so on, and the very Indian narrative of reincarnation, or rebirth. Through the latter, gothic tales of the uncanny, where the narrative is locked into a compulsion to repeat an earlier moment or revisit an earlier scene, are underpinned by a belief that is theosophical and religious.

Mishra points out that the Indian Gothic genre really came alive with Kamal Amrohi’s 1949 Mahal, it’s like the starting point. Almost a decade later Bimal Roy took the genre to another level with his 1958 haunting monochromatic Madhumati. Both films are obsessed with the Hindu theory of reincarnation, the whole idea that our past lives shape our present. Mishra argues that this is what gives Indian Gothic its edge, this notion that a tragic past life is the fuel for telling these dark, beautiful stories.

Amrohi and Roy tapped into the Gothic form to unpack this whole identity crisis, the messy past business, and it’s no coincidence it happened post 1947: India’s just got independence and we’re still figuring out who we are. But why horror? Why the irrational? Why the dark stuff? To get that, we need to step further into the past, to Rabindranath Tagore’s short stories, who was doing this Gothic thing way before films.

Prasanta Bhattacharyya, who’s like a guru in Gothic Literature, says that Tagore used terror in his stories to kind of flip the script on this whole Western rational thinking, to show there’s more to life than just logic. A classic example of this is Tagore’s The Hungry Stones.

The Hungry Stones, or Kshudhita Pashan, is this eerie haunting story from 1895. It’s about a tax collector who is put up to live in an ancient, haunted 250 year old Mughal palace in a fictional town, Barich. Tagore got the inspiration from the Moti Shahi Mahal in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, where he’d stayed while visiting his brother, Satyendranath Tagore, in 1878. He wrote about how the space sort of creeped him out, but also inspired him, like when you enter an ancient library and you’re engulfed with goosebumps, a thrilling sensation. Haunted by the lonely enormous rooms, Tagore felt like “history was like a skeleton there” and so he “dressed it up and in the museum of my mind, I created a whole image.”

In the story, the protagonist gets totally consumed by the ghostly, sensual vibes from the palace’s past, that he ends up losing his sense of reality. If you’re curious, the story’s free online, here’s the link. Also, fortunately for us, Tapan Sinha and Gulzar made films based on this powerful short story, more on that later.

Bhattacharyya breaks down this story, and it’s wild how horror’s the perfect vehicle to unpack this whole colonised mind thing, like somehow you can’t say it straight but by bringing in some ghosts and madness it suddenly hits different. The unnamed protagonist’s got a Western education, but he’s rooted in Indian culture which gets all tangled up when he arrives at the creepy, abandoned palace. Tagore manages to show how the irrational makes the history and culture seem more real.

The layered consciousness of the colonised mind, western-educated though traditionally moored to its Indian cultural roots, is laid bare on a remote uncanny site of distant history made gothically haunting though culturally relevant through the irrational means of terror, madness and repressed sexuality. …. The iconic building in Tagore’s story now becoming silent though ‘hungry’ points to some significant gaps in historical narration crying for retrieval through a search of the dead conveniently forgotten.

Pinpointing the DNA of the genre, Bhattacharyya basically breaks down the Indian Gothic formula. Like the old forgotten mansion is a staple, but he explains how it’s not just a prop, it’s a symbol of all this buried history, holding secrets, hungry for attention, craving to be remembered, to be brought back to life. It’s pointing to all this history we forgot, or maybe choose to forget.

Tagore could see through the euphoria and emerging success of the struggles of emancipation. In this context, we may once again refer to Punter who suggests that the postcolonial is a haunting- a haunted continuation of the colonial past: “As the great globalising project of modernity, which has its own controlling relationship to the postcolonial, rolls on, one of its more curious current effects is that, perhaps against expectation, we live increasingly in a world of ghosts, spirits, phantoms.”

So, it’s no coincidence Indian Gothic took off when it did. Amrohi and Roy exploring identities through the Gothic framework post independence makes total sense.

In India the 50s and 60s was this heady time of nation building, with mainstream films reflecting that, celebrating the move from village to city, embracing modernity. The Indian Gothic, on the other hand, is like it’s dark cousin. It’s got a gloomy air. It shifts the scene from the city to these misty hill stations or small towns, and dives into the darker side of history, all ambiguous and uncertain, no straightforward narrative. The protagonist in these films are modern and rational, but they’ve got one foot in this “wild” past, where a mysterious ghost is waiting, a symbol of their past life.

Now that we’re acquainted with the tradition of the Indian Gothic let’s get into the love stories that play out in them. They are intense, supernatural and usually born from some dark, violent event. Love transcends death and becomes this metaphysical thing, but leaving the spirit stuck, trapped at the scene of the tragedy, waiting for their soulmate to come back. It’s like, hope and love are on the same level, driving this endless wait.

So for this Valentine’s day, if you like me, like your romance tempered with a tiny amount of tantalising horror, I’ve put together a watchlist that explores this bittersweet overlap: ghosts crushing on living people. It’s a deliciously tortured premise, kind of heartbreaking but also strangely beautiful.

Kshudhita Pashan, Tapan Sinha, 1960

Tapan Sinha’s cinematic adaptation of Tagore’s Hungry Stones is a bewitching tale of eerie attachment. Soumitra Chatterjee plays the unnamed rational tax collector who’s stuck in a remote town which seems like it is in the middle of nowhere. He is put up at a creepy but captivating mansion by his work place. The locals warn him of ghostly presences, but he’s so taken in by the mystique of the Mughal grandeur that he dismisses them all. The thing is, the more nights he spends there, the more his reality gets fuzzy. A ghost of a beautiful dancer haunts him and it turns out that they’ve got this ancient connection, one which is centuries old.

Sinha creates this dreamy, nightmarish landscape. The film is a visually stunning, grainy immersive trip. You feel totally lost, like reality’s slipping away. As the plot unravels, you’re stuck with the tax collector caught in this shadowy world somewhere between the past and the present.

Kshudhita Pashan is available on Youtube and Prime Video.

Yeh Raat Phir Na Aaygi, Brij, 1966

Suraj, played by Biswajeet, becomes utterly captivated by the mysterious Kiran, portrayed with much loveliness by Sharmila Tagore. An artist with a talent for painting, Suraj is engaged to Rita, embodied by the gorgeous Mumtaaz, who’s an archaeologist. Their love life takes a dramatic turn when he encounters Kiran at an excavation site. She’s all elusive, appears out of nowhere, disappears into thin air, leaving Suraj spellbound.

Meanwhile, Rita and her father (Prithiviraj Kapoor) stumble upon a hidden chamber which houses this stunning statue of a dancer, who wildly, bears an uncanny resemblance to Kiran. Suraj’s obsession with Kiran grows, and he loses himself in it, leaving Rita heartbroken. I guess that’s the power of a metaphysical bond. Ultimately, Suraj is faced with an impossible choice, pitting life against death.

The film is a hidden gem, packed with great cast, a haunting grayscale palette, and a lingering soundtrack.

Yeh Raat Phir Na Aaygi is available on Youtube.

Neel Kamal, Ram Maheshwari, 1968

I had included Neel Kamal in my last year’s V Day watchlist as well! Based on Gulshan Nanda’s novel that goes by the same title, the film adaptation is spookily enchanting. Sita develops a habit of sleepwalking when she visits an ancient cave with her friends during a field trip, which grows even crazier after her marriage. She discovers that her sleepwalking is not an ordinary medical malady but something that is tinged with an essence of the uncanny. These midnight wanderings always lead her to a crumbling castle, where she uncovers a tragic episode from a past life. It seems she was once a princess, entwined in a doomed love affair with Chitrasen, the royal sculptor. Her dad, the king, finds their union so revolting that he has Chitrasen buried alive. Now, Chitrasen’s spirit haunts Sita, driven by a longing for reunion.

The film is a technicolor riot, its palette of reds, blues and pinks scream Dario Argentto-esqueness, but with a flair of its own. Also, do note that this film predates Suspiria by nearly a decade.

Neel Kamal is available on Youtube and Prime Video.

Mehbooba, Shakti Samanta, 1976

The name Suraj seems to be a fave for protagonists in reincarnation films because in Mehbooba we again meet a Suraj, this time, Rajesh Khanna essaying the role of a rockstar who’s haunted by visions of a lovely spectral lady. It all starts when he receives an ancient tanpura from his fiancée, Rita. Suddenly, he starts hearing a woman singing a haunting melody, one which only he can hear, and a gift which was meant to bring him joy brings him nothing but puzzlement and sleepless nights.

As the story unfolds, Suraj finds himself stranded at a dak bungalow on a rainy night, where he meets Ratna, the woman who’s been haunting him. He follows her to an old mansion, and the next morning, the guard drops a bombshell— Ratna’s been dead for a thousand years, her spirit still roams the halls, eeks.

A portrait of Ratna sparks a flashback. Suraj recalls his past life as Prakash, a talented singer hopelessly in love with Ratna, a beautiful dancer. Their love story was a doomed one with Prakash being engaged to someone else, and Ratna promised to the royal court. They decide to elope but are killed in their pursuit. In their final moments they promise to find each other again. Now, as visions of his past life flood him, Suraj sets out on a mission to find Ratna and make things right.

This film, like Neel Kamal, is based on yet another Gulshan Nanda novel, Sisakate Saaz. It’s a bit of a slow burn, and Rajesh Khanna as a rockstar takes some time getting used to, but the songs are great, the Rajasthan and Himachal landscapes are stunning, and the whole thing has a certain moody charm that makes this one a worthwhile watch.

Mehbooba is available on Youtube and Prime Video.

Lekin... , Gulzar, 1991

This film’s adaptation of Tagore’s Hungry Stones is pretty immsersive. Just like Tapan Sinha’s version, it’s contemplative and introspective, so you need to slow down and let the atmosphere sink in. Gulzar sets the story in the arid, endless dunes of the desert which creates this amazing sense of timelessness, as if the characters are stuck in some metaphysical limbo, which they actually are. Vinod Khanna portrays Sameer Niyogi, a compelling protagonist who is drawn into this mysterious world by Dimple Kapadia’s Reva. She appears to him with visions of a past life. He tries to unravel the secrets of her past, and the more he learns the more he’s determined to help her find peace. It’s actually a story about listening to someone’s story, the power of bearing witness, of bringing truth to light no matter how painful.

Lekin… is available on Youtube.

Hope you all have a love dovey with a dash of spooky weekend !

a painting of the passing of the mughal emporer, Shahjahan, looking at the taj, with his favourite daughter, Jahanara by his side

“bapa,” she whispers, clasping his wrists to feel his pulse. a damp wind rises over the yamuna river & flutters through her silk ghagra. the moon shines in its full glory, witnessing the reverence of this royal family. princess jahanara gently rocks her father whose cold skin remains still. titled the king of the world, Shahjahan, descends into the after world as a pauper. she wipes her tears, wailing and calling out to her brothers with whom he’ll unite soon.

“farewell, bapa,” she kisses his hands that smell like kashmiri apples. she rises from his side, her flushed cheeks smeared with dried salt. across the indigo river she can see the luminous tomb of her beloved mother, resting by the flowing river. she weeps, but relived that her father is out of his misery. nine years of agony & finally he can be with his begum, his aziz.

(via JHALAL DRUT: Mumtaz)

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