Arts
Standard formula
Peter Ackroyd
Gandhi ('A', Odeon Leicester Square)
4 Jo orbandar State. Some Years Later.'
1 So many years later, in fact, that the characters have to explain to each other what has been happening: Gandhi out of prison, thousands injured, another show- down coming. Let's go and have a look. Whenever two people engage in conversa- tion, all they seem to talk about are historical events. Enter Gandhi, looking vaguely like Alf Garnett in a loincloth. Pan- dit Nehru trudges warily behind him, and there is Lord Mountbatten, dressed to kill.
For those whose idea of historical truth is confirmed by the waxwork museum in Baker Street, Gandhi will come as a com- forting reminder that great men talk about great events in a grave and solemn manner, that truth and justice are quite easy con- cepts to grasp, especially when they are con- veniently enshrined in the beaming figure of the Mahatma himself. It must have seemed a good idea at the time — Gandhi is a suffi- ciently arresting title. They may have toyed with the idea of calling it 'The Mahatma', but it probably sounded too much like an American horror film.
A great deal of money has been poured into this enterprise; it is a multinational cor- poration of a film, with actors and techni- cians drawn from several countries under the aegis of its director and producer, Sir Richard Attenborough. And, since it is clearly designed to be an international hit, Attenborough obviously decided that it should have an international flavour. The result is rather like the food air hostesses serve in mid-Atlantic: by catering to all tastes, it caters to none. Any nourishment which might have been derived from its specifically Indian elements, or even from the fact that it has a very English director, has been drained from it in the process and it has been pumped instead full of artificial flavouring and rather suspicious coloration.
The tone of the film is apparent from the start; it opens with the assassination of Gandhi, which heralds what is in many ways a violent film, and then proceeds in swirls and eddies to cover the course of Gandhi's life ('career' does not have quite the right sound), from his days organising the Indians in southern Africa to his en- counters with the British and his eventual near-deification. Attenborough 's charac- teristic device, confronted by this broad historical tract, is to take what might be called the long view. He takes his cameras into the air and relies upon long tracking shots over vast crowds or vast spaces. As a result we get a number of large 'set scenes' — the massacre at Amritsar, Gandhi's march to the sea, Ghandi's funeral proces- sion. If the ability to choreograph a large number of people is in any way a distinc- tion, then Attenborough is to be con- gratulated. The problems emerge when he attempts to come in closer proximity to his characters: when he tries to make them talk, for example. `Bad news, I'm afraid, they're going to change the pass laws ... You write brilliantly but you have much to learn about Hindus'. The dialogue is at about the level of an American soap- opera.
The attempt at a convincing recreation of historical truth is not .helped by the presence of any number of guest stars who pop up like cardboard cut-outs. Here we have, in no particular order, Trevor Howard, Michael Hordern, Edward Fox and Martin Sheen. I left the auditorium for a minute or two, and when I returned Candice Bergen had appeared on the screen. I don't know what she was supposed to be doing there (of course I do know exactly what she was doing there: she was trying to attract an American audience who probably think that Gandhi, on the lines of Marnie, is the name of the character whom she plays). And here is Sir John Gielgud again. One has become so used to his presence now that it would be a shock to see a film without him.
The only bright spot in this three-and-a- half-hour extravaganza was the perfor- mance of Ben Kingsley as Gandhi himself. Despite the hagiographical hype of this film, Mr Kingsley was able to give the man a human face. He moved from youth to age with great tact and skill, subtly underplay- ing the part throughout so that, by the end, his performance carried real conviction. Here was a man whose self-effacement was a kind of device, so that he could be both
'Count your blessings — he who is low need fear no fall.'
himself and other than himself. It is c„leedaf from Gandhi's own actions that he reaus the power of symbolic gestures, and so turned himself into an image of the nall°11; He took its sufferings upon himself, an was thereby transformed. The consistenoi quietness of Ben Kingsley's presence (10, screen transmitted that quality very viehe and he was also able — perhaps against t1 grain of the director's intentions at the fanaticism and ruthlessness spmerihleaps lay beneath the surface of Gandhi The story of Gandhi is in fact an in; teresting one, but it was not enhanced hYof film which relied upon a strong eleruerl:„tot caricature in its portrayal of the 111'.ai figures, and upon an excess of sPecl pleading in its portrayal of the major one; so that all those who were 'for' were good, and all those 'against' him vatic Gandhi did not explain the cause or to, nature of Gandhi's popularity; and bY cc)ty centrating upon the saintliness, 111°desas and reticence of the man himself it wer unable to discuss in a convincing Manr111. the historical circumstances which Pr011i. ed him forward. The plasticity and Imre, se ty of the whole venture brought it very 03...0 to the manner and the matter of a televiswee series; certainly, it showed a similar abscrjap of historical imagination. This was Pre. history, personalised history, history as,• created by 'the stars'. It was not a succ'
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