Honour Keeper is yet another CIFF discovery – a delicate flower of a film by a first time director that unfolds to reveal itself in its own time and its own way. First time feature director/writer Pushpendra Singh has taken a Rajathani folk tale and placed in a setting that could be mistaken for centuries ago, were it not for the occasional glimpses of wind turbines.
The folk tale is called Lajwanti, after the young, married woman who is one of the two leads. Every day, the women of her village walk to a well to collect water for the day. Every day, they chatter and lift their veils – all except Lajwanti who wears her veil to maintain her honor.. The others tease her, postulating that she refuses to lift her veil because ‘she has toad lips,’ or is too ugly to bear – but when they forcibly lift her veil, she is more beautiful than any of them.
Every day, as the woman walk to and from the well, they encounter a man dressed all in white. He invariably turns from the path so as to not gaze upon them. Most days, he is carrying a pair of doves.
For a time the women ponder whether he is crazy, or not. Lajwanti is intrigued. When the women’s teasing becomes too much for her, she decides to go to the well by herself – every day encountering the unfailingly deferent gentleman in white, usually with doves, but not always. Finally, she removes her veil and attempts to engage him in conversation…
Shot in the Thar Desert utilizing a cast mixing actors and locals, Singh takes a story that is as romantic as it is lovely. He finds poetry in lone trees and the handmade homes of the villagers; in the local music (all music in the film is performed by locals), and in the way the women’s travel to the well echoes an early shot of a caravan of camels – with one camel following well behind (and sounding very left out).
The Honour Keeper takes us to a place where customs are radically different and allows to learn them in the context of a tale that is universal. The cinematography is stunningly gorgeous and the music, though using an unfamiliar scale, enticing.
Sanghmitra Hitaishi’s Lajwanti is beautiful, but she is no delicate flower. She stands up to peer pressure and certainly goes her own way – setting goals and working hard to meet them. Director Singh plays the Man With Doves as the consummate gentleman and a man with a quest that must be fulfilled before he can do anything else.
The Man With Doves comes to his quest through a dream and is convinced that when he completes it (it being collecting a certain number of doves), he will receive what he most desires. Lajwanti discovers that what she has and what she wants are not the same thing – and, in a way, is following her own dream.
The Honour Keeper is subtle, but rich with cinematic flavors and colors we do not usually get – and is the furthest thing imaginable from the stereotypical Bollywood films that we expect to see. Singh shows us another side of India and does so beautifully.
Final Grade: A