36 CHOWRINGHEE LANE - AN EVE INSPIRING MOVIE

36  Chowringhee  Lane  -  An Eve inspiring Movie

Aparna  Sen

This International Women’s Day, I thought of awarding rich tribute to two women particularly and another woman to some extent for their invaluable contribution to the film “36 Chowringhee Lane” a 1981 Indian film in the English language. Being the sensitive and sentimental person that I am, this movie has touched and stirred the bottom of my heart and pulled the strings of my sentimental chord.

 

The debutant Director Aparna Sen has done a brilliant job with the film “36 Chowringhee Lane”. The central pivotal character of the film is Violet Stoneham, an old Anglo-Indian Christian teacher, the immortal role excellently essayed by Jennifer Kendal. These two women deserve high accolade for their role play in making this film artistically an acclaimed one and a timeless wonder. The third woman is the female lead player, tall and ravishing Bonga (Bengali) beauty Debashree Roy as Nandita, an ex-student of Violet Stoneham. These three women collectively amassed kudos for making this film a memorable one. My heart goes out to present high notations to these wonderful women on this International Women’s Day, almost 43 years since the film's release.

While we celebrate International Women’s Day, I wish equality, empowerment, and emancipation of women in the world.


The film is produced by Bollywood actor, director, and producer Shashi Kapoor the real-life husband of Jennifer Kendal, and an accomplished Bollywood Kapoor clan the youngest scion of Bollywood actor Prithviraj Kapoor.

 

The art direction of the film is done by Bansi Chandragupta who died due to a heart attack during the making of this film and the movie is dedicated to him.


Ashok Mehta with his brilliant Cinematography and Vanraj Bhatia, the music composer who gives a haunting background score both deserves a mention for making this film a huge success.

 

36 Chowringhee Lane the name was originated from the address, a small apartment located on a small street in Kolkotta, in which Violet Stoneham lived close to the famous cricket ground Eden Gardens, Kolkotta. The other important landmarks to the house being High Court and the Governor’s residence.

 

The film won Golden Lotus in National Film Awards for Best Direction, Best Feature Film in English, and Best Cinematography. Jennifer Kendal was nominated for the Best Actress Award in the BAFTA Awards and won the Best Actress Award in the 1982 Evening Standard British Film Awards (UK).

 

Miss Stoneham’s brother Eddie portrayed by Geoffrey Kendal who is the real life father of Jennifer Kendal.

I was literally blown away by the performance of Jennifer Kendal as the school teacher Violet Stoneham. She was kind, caring, and unsuspectingly loving towards her former student Nandita and her author boyfriend Samaresh, Dhirtiman Chatterjee. The sequences in which the teacher comes to know that the couple exploited her goodness is deeply touching and unforgettable. The lonely and recluse life of the teacher and her pet kitten and the antique nature of her house is artistically directed.

 

 

The pre-marital sex was a taboo in Indian society when this film was made. Aparna Sen has portrayed the same with nonchalance, ease, and finesse. Calcutta now known as Kolkotta has a cosmopolitan young culture, well versed with the West.

The central character of the movie is an Anglo-Indian teacher, Violet Stoneham, I would like to share a few words about the Anglo-Indian Christian community. Miss Stoneham loved the country she was born in and treated everyone with kindness.

Anglo-Indian Christian community

Anglo-Indian was a class created by the ruling British. They were Christian and well-educated. The colonial masters needed this class as much as the Anglo-Indian class needed them.

They were given jobs in the Civil Service, Army, Customs, Railways, and plum Government jobs. When India became independent this privilege was withdrawn. These jobs were thrown open to the wider populace.

Post India's independence, this community nurtured a dream to migrate to London, UK. After the end of the British Empire in India, most of the Anglo-Indians left India and settled in the UK, USA, and Australia.

 

 

 

Now, I would like to present a SYNOPSIS of the movie here -

 

Violet Stoneham, an Anglo-Indian schoolteacher who teaches Shakespeare to un-attentive students, lives a secluded lonely life in a small apartment on a small street in Kolkotta. Her niece who used to live with her got married and gone abroad leaving behind Violet Stoneham in recluse. Her brother Eddie aged and ailing harbored in a shelter home for old age people. She visits him quite often with biscuits and cake. Stoneham lost her betrothed David in a war and remained a spinster.

 

One day in her uneventful life, one of her former student Nandita stumbles upon her. She introduced her author boyfriend Samaresh to Miss Stoneham and they became a company. After spending a few joyful days together, Nandita suggests that the couple does not have a haven to pursue the writing of a novel by Samaresh. The kind, caring, and unsuspectingly loving Miss Stoneham immediately offers them her house for literary pursuits while she is away in School. The couple pampers the teacher in their joyful company and at the same time exploits her goodness by using her apartment for their pre-marital sexual escapades when she is not around. Miss Stoneham treats them as her own family members and loves them the most and enjoy their nearness. Miss Stoneham was exploited by the young lovers and made her home a lovers' nest. When she comes to know the camaraderie of Nandita and Samaresh in an embrace and kissing due to the partially opened door when she returns from school, she feels cheated by them. 

 

 

After some time Nandita and Samaresh get married and moves in to a posh residence presented to her by her father as a wedding gift. Samaresh was well employed and enjoyed rich clientele as friends.

 

In the meantime, Eddie dies in the old age home and leaves Miss Stoneham all alone.

 

One Christmas Day, Miss Stoneham wanted to visit the young couple with a cake specially baked for them by her and sought their appointment. The couple avoids the teacher with an excuse that they are out of town on that day. However, Miss Stoneham decides to drop the cake at their residence and reaches there to find to her utter dismay that the couple was celebrating a party with their friends and loved ones. This shatters Miss Stoneham and quietly she departs from the scene and sits in a public park with a stray dog for her company. The movie ends with the frame of Miss Stoneham walking away with the packed cake followed by a sniffer stray dog who smelt the sweetness of the cake.

The movie belongs to Aparna Sen who has written the screenplay and directed the film and Jennifer Kendal for her sensitive and brilliant performance as the teacher Miss Stoneham. Jennifer Kendal is astonishing as Violet Stoneham, a lonely woman but despite that, is never embittered, being very lovely, kind, caring, and positive. With heartbreaking anguish, touching vulnerability, and total warmth and authenticity Jennifer Kendal brings Violet Stoneham to life in a heartfelt performance that tugs at the heartstrings and resonates in memory long after the film is over. This could be the greatest gift her real-life husband Shashi Kapoor, the producer of the film, could have given to her.

 

 

The individual as a trace of a colonial past – living in a particular commonly known address of a nostalgic metropolis – succeeds to send us a universal appeal to anybody in the periphery of any society. The intensity of loneliness has been unfolded by amazingly sensitive details of the daily existence of Violet Stoneham.

 

The surrealist treatment of the past and unconscious in representations of dreams, love, pain, and fear of death of lonely English individuals introduces the Indian spectators to a different film language. It helps them visualizing an exotic theme growing out of their own cultural space.

 

 

Aparna Sen starts of like a seasoned campaigner in her debutant Director’s role. She has carefully crafted the characters in this film and evoked a spirited performance from the cast. The Christmas Carol song "Silent Night, Holy Night" is well picturized. Aparna Sen scores big time as she unfolds and illustrates with detailed delicacy Violet Stoneham’s lonely present and rich past, which is sensitive, absorbing, and lifelike. Aparna Sen makes this film really easy to relate to, building a serene narrative style that creates a thought-provoking, quietly powerful picture. Technically the movie is stupendous.

 

Aparna Sen’s direction is unparalleled and extraordinaire.