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Court, the debut feature from Indian filmmaker Chaitanya Tamhane, progresses with stark realism and a touch of absurdity. It is a personal contention with a culture marked by a distant past, one in which vibrancy faces up against traditionalism; artistic expression against bureaucracy. Tamhane, for a first-time director, demonstrates explosive confidence in his camera, his actors and his script, with his ear for satire and eye for depth strikingly well-balanced. His final product is a tad muted and, at times, in need of a shot of adrenaline. But it’s always smart, and in particular mines superbly-timed humor from a place of deep pain and close understanding.
The film centers on the arrest of Narayan Kamble (Vira Sathidir), a relatively popular folk singer and poet in Mumbai whose artistic appeal stems from his provocative, incisive language. He is taken into custody for a most tertiary concern: a sewage worker, who lived near the location where Kamble recently performed, is said to have killed himself, the police under the impression that Kamble’s lyrics encouraged him to do it. The worker’s family has taken off, and the circumstances of his death are admittedly ambiguous. But the trial that 65 year-old Narayan faces is incomprehensible: without a shred of proof, he’s kept in judicial custody month after month, even as it’s revealed that his lyrics in no way alluded to workers committing suicide, and despite the fact that his health is debilitating.
The state prosecutors perpetuate the trial by relying on old Victorian law from centuries ago that, put simply, has no place in contemporary India. But it remains the law of the land. The way the “crimes” are investigated, or the “evidence” is presented, is expressed by Tamhane with a willing, cunning satirical edge. He doesn’t lose sight of the trial’s actual ramifications on the man’s life, but he’s also not shy about exposing just how funny and ridiculous the process is. Tamhane keeps everything based in reality, and ultimately that’s as great an asset as a weakness. In moments of humor or despair, his methods as a filmmaker are extremely effectual. But there also remains a dryness and a mutedness to the proceedings that can be difficult to hold onto during those lengthy in-between sequences. Court doesn’t work too hard to maintain your attention. It expects it.
The film ventures into more durably interesting territory, though, as its focus extends beyond the actual trial. It takes time off to examine the participants of the trial: Narayan’s attorney, a progressive, modern human rights advocate who humorously, endlessly argues with his parents over life’s great mundanities; the state prosecutor, who though initially is seen as doing the devil’s work is fleshed out, pulling her weight as a working mother and adjusting the diet of her diabetes-diagnosed husband; and finally the judge, who in a film-ending sequence is revealed as less than the kind of man you’d want as the arbiter on artistic expression. With these characters, however tertiary in this broad canvassing of Mumbai, Court resonates deeply. Tamhane is an exceptionally-gifted realist, exposing familial dynamics and regional colors with coarse humor just genuine enough to slide away from mockery. He possesses the same loving and yet anguished relationship to his culture and background as Alexander Payne conveys in Nebraska. The two also share a preference for lingering, still shots of families in action, whether eating lunch or simply sitting in a room. There’s a playful jab in the imagery, exposing simultaneous beauty and absurdity.
The skeleton of the story evokes Franz Kafka to some degree, fashioning a rigid anti-bureaucratic narrative with a twinge of sweetly funny melancholy. The trial rolls on month after month, with the state’s case growing thinner and thinner. Through much of the movie, there’s a feeling of Tamhane really wrestling with India’s complex relationship to modernity. Immediately after the trial at hand is pushed back another month, a woman’s case is indefinitely postponed because she’s wearing a sleeveless top. It’s a rare moment of outrage from a filmmaker who predominantly favors humor. And it lingers throughout -- in the question of freedom of expression, judicial equality, even technological etiquette. Tamhane’s struggle with his identity filters seamlessly into his work, exposing a culture at odds with itself, pitting its values against its history.
That idea -- that vision -- is documented through the camera. Peering into the lives of various people around Mumbai, the unwavering naturalism of the style is characteristic of the Dardenne Brothers. As it heads into another person’s home, the camera staunchly avoids cutting. But even more rigidly, the thing hardly moves: whereas the Dardennes flow quite freely with their image, Tamhane keeps a fixed position, allowing characters to walk in and out of frame and making it seem as if we’re eavesdropping on these lives -- as if they are somewhat closed-off. It’s a great, consistently-applied visual communication that nicely complements the narrative.
Court opens on Narayan performing, and introduces the contradictions, flair and poetics of the region. Tamhane’s vision is all about authenticity: never veering into false drama or heightened characterizations. Both its satire and tragedy are rooted in places of piercing reality. And so even when Court feels like a bit of a drag -- ending on a less poignant note than it could have, for instance -- there’s a fullness in the depiction of this world. Tamhane’s methods might end up too cerebral or quiet for some, but the still, long takes and extensive moments of silence set an inescapably haunting tone. The humor’s the respite for a brutally frank account of bureaucratic inefficiency. It’s worth the investment: this is prickly, snappy and brilliantly original cinema, quite unlike anything else out there.
Grade: A-
Screened at New Directors New Films, Presented by MoMA and the Film Society at Lincoln Center