There's an affected grandeur to this which comes from its stagey feel, like a David Lean film, or rather those of Merchant-Ivory (themselves scions of Lean). There is also more than a touch of Asian "aesthetic cinema" (such as Tran's "Vertical Ray of the Sun") in which every scene has to be ridiculously picturesque (for goodness' sake, must we have those garlands framing every shot?).
It purports to be an issues film - the issue being the lives of Indian widows who have to retire from society into a refuge for the rest of their lives - even in the case of toddlers who were betrothed and widowed in their minority. Heavy possibilities here, but any potential for serious treatment is quickly abandoned in favour of a romantic mushiness of quite cosmic banality.
Water appears in many guises throughout, but there's no meaning to it, just empty imagery. I could start this review again and rejudge the film according to a lower set of intellectual standards, but then I would just say that it is nice to look at and is engagingly told, when it could have been so much more.
It purports to be an issues film - the issue being the lives of Indian widows who have to retire from society into a refuge for the rest of their lives - even in the case of toddlers who were betrothed and widowed in their minority. Heavy possibilities here, but any potential for serious treatment is quickly abandoned in favour of a romantic mushiness of quite cosmic banality.
Water appears in many guises throughout, but there's no meaning to it, just empty imagery. I could start this review again and rejudge the film according to a lower set of intellectual standards, but then I would just say that it is nice to look at and is engagingly told, when it could have been so much more.