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| Sunday, 2 October 2005 |
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Nightmarish journey through the forsaken land by Aditha Dissanayake Impression; 20 minutes into the movie, I wish I had not come. Impression during the intermission; "I wish I had not come".
Yet, this is the movie Dr. Lester James Peris praised as a "remarkable film debut and a unique achievement for Sri Lankan cinema" (Daily News, September 19) Why didn't I like it? Certainly not because it gives a negative impression of Sri Lankan soldiers. And certainly not because of the nudity. On the contrary, I admire Vimukthi Jayasundera for having the guts to expose the male and female anatomy without conventional inhibitions. But, and it is this BUT which is important, I wish Vimukthi had directed all that sensitivity, energy, talent and what not, into generating positive emotions in the viewer. If he tries to show a ray of hope in the last scene where Aruna places Batti on a bus which would take her into a better world, it is such a thin ray, it goes almost undetected. Yes, the acting is superb. Mahendra Perera, Kaushalya Fernando, Hemasiri Liyanage, Nilupuli Jayawardena and Sapuni Peiris perform as though the roles had been tailor made for them. And Saumya Liyanage. Could it be that everyone is irked about the image of the army because of his authentic acting? So real does he seem that one can't help but wish fervently that all men do not behave the way he behaves in the mating process. And to think, that in my naivete I had not recognised what Batti tastes on the floor of an abandoned building is seminal fluid. Till I read so in a review, I had rated the suicide scene and the hacking scene as the most nauseating. But now that I know its not white paint that Batti licks with her finger, I am sure this scene too will continue to flit through my mind every waking minute of the day for a long time to come. Surely the world is not as dark as how Vimukthi shows it to be in Sulanga Enu Pinisa? Even in the most arid landscape love need not be so sordid? Why could not Vimukthi see the same positive picture Daya Dissanayake describes in a poem titled "Desert" in his book "Inequality"? "The arid desert/was lifeless,/silent/nothing moved under the burning sun/till you showed me/the tiny creatures crawling over the sand/I heard their laughter and the singing/as I saw the moss and lichen/on the rocks/brought to life and nourished by the sun". If you are someone like me who seeks innocent entertainment from a movie, if you wish not to have nightmarish images impinged on your mind for the rest of your life Sulanga Enu Pinisa is not for you. If you do wish to have your brains sawn apart, however, trying to understand the human condition, stay at home and read Dostoevsky' s Crime and Punishment instead. Perhaps by the time Vimukthi makes his next movie he would have heard a
different version of the story of Kati Kirilli, he would have realised love
can be beautiful too even if it is between a soldier and a married woman,
even if it is a yearning for sexual fulfilment in a spinster, even on a
forsaken land. |
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Yet when my colleague who had led me there asks "Do you wish you had not
come?" I lie and say "No!" and wait for the lights to dim, the second half
to begin, feeling that the sooner it ends the better. Impression after the
movie as I walk out of Cine City, Maradana, "I wish I had not come". And
finally, the impression right now, two weeks later, I wish I had not seen
Sulanga Enu Pinisa. 
