“If any thing is
sacred, the human body is sacred.”
(Walt Whitman)
At the beginning, ocean
waves on a beach in Goa, a popular region for Indians and tourists
from abroad. The over voice commentary of Anamika Bandopadhyay tells
about this place and the pleasure of drinking coconut water. She
recalls the stories told by her grandmother. On the beach we see an
old woman and a young girl with sun glasses. For a short moment it
appears like an idyll evoked by a Marcel Proust- like memory and
caused by coconut water, the pendant to the Madeleine, a French
pastry occurring in Proust´s novel In Search of lost times.
The second part of the
film´s introduction is a harsh contrast: News headlines report about
the gang raping case in Delhi from December 16, 2012 which lead to
the death of the victim, a young woman. Images of angry protesting
Indian women follow. In the following months after this tragic event
a series of gang raping all over the country followed. The public
finally took attention on rape cases even though they happened as
well long before December 2012. It was evident that the perpetrators
felt very safe without the fear being indicted.
Anamika Bandopadhyay
mentions that there is no sex education (maturation curriculum) in
Indian schools. Her son absolved it already at the age of 11 in an
American school. The Indian government rejects the idea of sex
education in schools because they say it is “against the Indian
tradition”. In Germany for example (which is far from being a
pioneering country in this case) sex education in schools was from up
around 1975 already obligatory and no biology teacher could refuse to
teach sex education anymore.
“What is the “Indian
tradition” asks Anamika Bandopadhyay and her journey to different
places in and periods of Indian history begins.
In the films by Anamika
Bandopadhyay I have seen so far, it is impossible to separate the
poet from the scholar or the human right activist. Like in her
previous films Red (2008) and 1700 Kelvin (2012) she is
completely involved.
The Third Breast is
a film essay about the contradictions in the Indian culture history
of sexuality. On one hand in modern India a total ban of sex in
culture and education, on the other hand a brutal oppression of
women. As rape is by politicians often underplayed as accidental
events, it appears soon that it is caused by a misogyny deeply rooted
in the history of colonial and post colonial India. With her
questions, for example “What is the Indian tradition?, the
filmmaker goes back to the distant past of India. Interviews with
different people, scientists, activists or young students give hints
to a deeper truth of “Indian tradition”. One of the essential
elements of the filmmaker´s research is the comparison between a
relatively liberal attitude towards sexuality in the medieval India
and its absurd oppression in modern India. This ancient attitude or
let me use knowledge of sexuality is documented in old texts,
paintings, sculptures and poetry. At least the erotic sculptures in
some temples in India are still accessible and proof this once total
different attitude towards sexuality in this culture. Even without
knowing KamaSutra, it is widely accepted that India has one of the
oldest knowledge about the human body. As we experience in this that
sex has quite a lot to do with “Indian tradition”. Bandopadhyay
works with different elements, the interviews, collage, images as
evidence but often as well with a certain playfulness. Beside the
researches there is always as well the element of the experience she
made during her journey, a reminder that she, the filmmaker is always
a part of the complex history she reveals in her recorded images.
The texts by Geet Govinda,
the erotic sculptures in several temples which depict sexual
practice or even old texts which describe the sexual relationship
between the “iconic” Indian (unmarried) lovers Radha and Krishna
are in existence. The film is also a confrontation of images, the
ones of a relatively liberal sexual moral in the past and the
hypocritical images of the present moral of in post colonial India
which are established today. And in this confrontation of dominating
and suppressed images like established and suppressed ideas of
humanity, Bandopadhyay uses one of the most important nature of film,
the presentation of images.
She also integrates small
episodes where she appears in front of the camera.
In one of them she
explains a souvenir seller in Varanasi an object that he has in his
collection symbolizes the penis of a Hindu-god. That disturbs not
only the seller but as well a client is refusing to buy it.
Even among a group of open
minded young people the image of a naked goddess displaying vagina
and breasts causes for some of them feelings of discomfort.
Paradoxically the tradition of India appears for some contemporaries
as something very strange and exotic. Parents,tells Bandopadhyay,
avoid to visit with their children these temples with erotic
sculptures.
One of the aspects I value
most, is that Anamika Bandopadhyay despite her involvement in the
subject appears never predetermined and it seems we even witness with
her a lot of discoveries she made during this journey. Her questions
are punctuating the film and bring us closer to a truth than hasty
answers.
There is, for example a
moment where it is mentioned that the menstruation was in ancient
times regarded as a sign of purity of a woman. Temples with statues
of naked goddesses were closed for four days a month when the goddess
“menstruates” Later , the menstruation as a symbol of purity and
even divineness was distorted into a sign of impurity and these
temples denied access for menstruating women. What changed this
attitude? One hint mentioned in an interview is the fatal combination
of the prudery of the British colonial rulers and the prudery of the
Brahmin cast. For a long time the tribal culture was relatively
uninfluenced by sexual moral of India. Tribal women had more freedom
to choose and separate again from their partner. But even these last
traces of a different India seem to have disappeared. Another offered
explanation is the rise of a Right wing movement which originated in
the 1930s and which took its inspiration from a distorted
Hindu-ideology and which includes the vilification of women and the
discrimination of lower cast people.
The Third Breast
offers different accesses to a
certain aspect in Indian culture history and it gives an idea about
the complexity of this country. Despite its analytical aspect there
is also the “caméra stylo” - element. It is an insight and the
film does not leave one moment of doubt that it is made by a woman
from its culture. Like the incredible trilogy on the partition of
Bengal by one of her spiritual mentors Ritwik Ghatak there is a
relationship between the global history and how it is affecting the
person who tells us about.
The
filmmaker´s questions open the space for new perceptions. Even if
she blames religious fanaticism, The Third Breast
includes not a statement against religion in general but points out against misuse and distortion Her films are
never made with this smart predetermined “I know it all”
attitude. That let her appears literally “Unarmed” and
vulnerable. The moment when she tries to comfort one of the abused
women in Red ,
illustrates what I mean quite accurate.
Once
we see her in an alternative temple called Devipuram, founded by an
atom physicist. It is a temple where women are worshipped and we see
her washed by temple servants. It is again one of the protected zones
for women in this film. At the end we see again the old woman and the
girl with the sun glasses on the beach a poetic image for a memory
and another of these “protected zones” in this film, where
oppression and abuses of women is suspended for a short while. This
moments reminds me in a moment from one of her previous films Rough
Cut, actually the only moment
from this film ( which is probably lost) available for me. Only about
5 wonderful minutes are available on Bandopadhyay´s YouTube channel.
A man and a young girl are in a temple. The man is painting or busy
with a maintenance of one of the sculptures. The girl stands in front
of a naked goddess. On her toe tips she stretches her body to touch
the statue. She is measuring the size of the artificial body,
touching its proportions and compares them with the proportions of
her own. Her actions are like unspoken questions. Whenever I have to
articulate my appreciation for Anamika Bandopadhyay´s films this
fragment comes to my mind.
At
the end of The Third Breast,
the filmmaker reveals the story of the goddess Meenakshi as told by
her grandmother. Meenakshi is born with a third breast. The parents
were worried about this “deformation” and raised her like a boy.
Some consider it not as a deformation but an extra of erotic appeal
or strength. The film ends with the image of the old woman and the
girl with sun glasses on the beach in front of the ocean waves. They
are at the same time exposed to a natural force but the image is one
of these “protected zones”. A fleeting moment in a film which
told us so much about a disturbed world where women have to struggle
to assert their space.
The Third Breast
is another example for a “committed “ cinema which is full of
compassion, anger but also tenderness without giving in for a second
to any kind of sensationalism. I feel confidence in these images
which appear to me as documented of true encounters, true experiences
and true reflections.
Rüdiger
Tomczak
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