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The Criterion Channel Presents: The River (1951)


There’s something delightfully, subtly daring about Jean Renoir’s The River, a coming-of-age story about a young white girl living on the banks of the Ganges. On the surface it looks positively, unashamedly colonialist to depict India and its’ culture purely from the lens of a westerner, a very privileged one at that, most often concerned with her crush on a visiting soldier and her jealousy of another, slightly wealthier white settler girl. It might seem like just another exercise in exploiting a country’s exotic aspects to make it appear palatable for European audiences, encouraging further notions of colonialism. But The River, releasing in 1951, not ten years out from India’s independence, is a much more nuanced film than that, one that is genuinely curious and enticed by the culture it extols, and far more universal in theme than it might otherwise appear.
The River is a pretty significant movie. It’s a favourite of Martin Scorsese’s, it directly inspired Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited, and it kicked off the career of Satyajit Ray, who was an assistant director on the film and who’s touch I think is apparent from time to time. It is a movie centred on an English family living in India past the end of their nations’ empire there and who are in some curious ways embedded into the culture. The children, of which the central Harriet (Patricia Walters) is the oldest, have only ever known life in India, and while they are clear westerners in many of their values and privileges (Harriet really stands out in the bazaar in her exceptionally nice and expensive clothing), there is a curious conflation of their two worlds. The children seem raised Christian, but believe in reincarnation, as well as several of the myths and tales of Hinduism, in which they have a pronounced admiration and respect. Rumer Godden, author of the book the film is based on (also the author of Black Narcissus) drew from her own experiences growing up in India during the waning years of the British Raj. And her voice comes through in the elaborate narration from an adult Harriet (June Hillman), which plays as both the reminiscence of someone fondly recalling the minute details of a world she loved, and an educational travelogue discussing the culture and way of life of the people there -Renoir often illustrating these sequences that have little narrative relevance with documentary-like footage of the river or the routines of the people around it. He was aware perhaps of his responsibility in capturing India rather than appropriating it.
He was also sure to break a few taboos in the process. Certainly the movie’s portrait of Hinduism as a valid alternative to western Christianity (which is barely considered) might have ruffled a few feathers. Bolder though is the non-judgemental inclusion of interracial romance, both the allusion to one in Harriet’s neighbour Mr. John (Arthur Shields) having been married to an Indian woman, and the direct implication of another in his daughter Melanie (Radha Burnier) being involved with Captain John (Thomas E. Breen), the object of all the girls’ affections. Therein lies another curious focus of the movie, on Harriet’s nascent sexuality and the numerous things she does to convey maturity and impress her crush.
One of the ways she does this is by a sharing a story from her diary about a humble romance that is granted divine intervention, and which is interestingly a metaphorical microcosm of her own story and the objectives of the movie itself. Portrayed as a fantasy in which Melanie takes on one of the key roles, it is the most enrapturing part of the movie. The technicolour, already astounding, here really shines, through vivid elaborate costuming and the stunning blue make-up on the Krishna groom. The dance sequence by the bride is magnificent too, the camera remaining still as Radha, the most compelling cast member by far, moves with such rhythm and sharpness to a very strong beat by the accompanying musicians. It’s a distraction that is extremely welcome and I wish more of the movie could have been given over to Harriet’s storytelling.
Being an outsider in this world but not entirely cognizant of it, I think gives Harriet’s very typical coming-of-age story with first love and even tragedy a more pervasive resonance than perhaps other movies that go there. And while it can be read with the theme of colonial decline, the British feeling more and more out of place in this land as the movie goes on, there’s a calming degree of natural perpetuity throughout as well, to their lives and relationships, to this country -ebbing and flowing much like the river Harriet is so enamoured with.
 
Criterion Recommendation: Girlhood (2014)
Celine Sciamma’s Portrait of a Lady on Fire may be her masterpiece, but before it her best film was an urban coming-of-age drama about black teenagers in Paris called Girlhood (no connection to Richard Linklater’s Boyhood, which came out the same year). Centring on Marieme (Karidja Touré), an abused and neglected introvert living in a poor neighbourhood who falls in with a clique of tough girls in the hopes of attracting her brothers’ friend, it is a movie of peer pressure, assertiveness, sexual responsibility, and independence filtered through a very distinct intersectionality of racial, class, and gendered lenses. The film not only provides vital insight into the unique struggles and lack of mobility for its’ characters, but it keenly explores their relationships with substantial depth. The central four are bullies to each other as much as to strangers, but they are also sisters with a very specific endearing connection. Girlhood brings attention to a significantly marginalized community in France and French media, and does so with astonishing authenticity and love. And it’s also got one of the best, most empowering needle-drops (and of a Rihanna song no less) in any movie!

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