voice over comparision

Remembrance of things present vs. First lesson in peace

The entire personas of the two films were very different. As aggressive the narrator of “remembrance…” was, the narrator of “first lessons…” was that soft. While one was questioning her early marriage, that she believed ruined her life, the other was giving his daughter answers and was telling her why he did what he did, so that she could be free to take her own stand on the Arab - Israel war.
“Remembrance of things present” comes across as an auto-biography, the childhood of a girl from her own perspective, but as a grown and mature woman, who questions the people who stole her youth from her. It comes across as a rebellion, Chandra Siddan is seen questioning and confronting all her aunties and uncles who arranged and got her married when she was a child of 15. The voice over comes across as a strong character, who states rather than mentions, and takes decisions on her own. Personally, I feel the voice over, by being redundant about the fact that she has been victimized, is trying to gain our sympathy and tries to influence others into agreeing with her viewpoints. The character may be strong initially, but somewhere down the line, tends to loose the point of the film.
“First lessons in peace” is a letter a father writes to his daughter, telling her why she was put in Neveh Shalom, a school of Arabs and Jews, during the war. The father comes across as a compassionate man, who gives his daughter the freedom to choose her stand and path during the Arab- Israel conflict, capturing her thoughts and her dynamic views on the Arabs and the war. He encourages her to feel the same way about Arabs as she feels about Jews, and at times is unsure about his decision of admitting her in a school for both Arabs and Jews and is worried about her safety. The character is somewhat neutral and open, and tries to bring out both sides of the conflict, and tried to show his daughter what Neveh shalom was trying to do, what Neveh shalom stood for- a place where the Arabs and the Jewish could co-exist.

Young Historians

"Young Historians (India, 2007) is a series of nine films designed, produced and directed by Deepa Dhanraj for the Government of Karnataka for their Edusat programme. Here, children from government schools in Karnataka are introduced to the processes and methodologies of how history is constructed. The films facilitate a creative process of giving students and teachers a lively and relevant experience of mapping history for themselves, by which incremental learning can take place."

It has been two years that I have left school, and 4 years that I stopped going for History classes. 4 years isn’t a long time span, after all, I still remember 1+1=2. But I simply cannot recall the Mughal emperors in order, or name any 3 of the viceroys of India. History classes were classes that required no thinking work, just a whole lot of mugging up and learning.

The way Deepa Dhanraj has introduced a subject like History in her film, is extraordinary. Interactive, exciting, and simple. Introducing a subject like history by asking the students to find out about their own histories, their own family trees, got the point of history across- why do we have a subject like history? The past is the past, why re-visit it? Why study History at all? To document, to preserve, and to understand our past. What lacked most in the history class in my school was reason and exploration. On the other hand, these children, have not only learnt the point of history, but have also learned to question more. The interaction seen within the classroom was immense, children were fearlessly asking questions.

The question that still remains is who is the target audience for the film? Is it finally the children who are going to watch it or teachers? If more children are introduced to a subject as dull as history, the face of the subject shall change. It will no longer remain a boring period in school, but an interesting one. The impact of teaching a subject well can be life-changing. Not many people these days want a career in education and history. But with these kind of movies coming around, and more and more children becoming interested in a subject like History, quite a few of them would want a career as a historian or an archaeologist or even as a history educationist!

Probably if I had been taught history this way, rather than sleeping through class and making my mother help me out with the subject one day before the final exam, I would have scored good marks without having to go through so much trouble. Perhaps I would have become an archaeologist, if the subject interested me enough back then. I believe this series of films should not just be kept for government schools in backward/ rural areas. They should be screened in every school possible. If a subject like history could be communicated using a medium like film-making, the exam patterns, etc. would also have to be changed. Bringing about this kind of a change could be difficult, but the counter-change this (change) would bring about, would be well worth it!