Inequality

Ray’s Fable and a Big Game

Short Film Analysis

The cinema’s characteristic forte is its ability to capture and communicate the intimacies of the human mind… The cinema is superbly equipped to trace the growth of a person or a situation.
Satyajit Ray

A child’s mind – impressionable, unbiased, bold, colourful and spirited – picks up the colours of this patterned and cemented world, crossing the maze, chasing dreams, breaking away, yet gradually getting engulfed by it wholly. How come? And Why?

Ray’s short film – Two: A Film Fable (1964), twelve minutes long, black and white, without any dialogues – shows ‘how’, leaving the ‘why’ for the viewer to find out.

For a better understanding, watch the film before reading further –

Story

Fable, a short story that tells a moral truth, often using animals as characters, is given a twist by Satyajit Ray for here we aren’t told anything, just shown and we don’t see animals but toys that are class-conscious.

With two little kids as the protagonists and only people in the film, it makes a striking portrayal of the class difference in our societies that nurtures and feeds, without fail, every individual, even a child, with a prejudiced ideology.

The little kids in the film, one up in a mansion and the other outside his thatched hut, start a competition of showing off their toys to each other. Soon the privileged kid starts to overpower the poor kid by showing his latest toys one after the other; he proudly and pompously uses his air gun to shoot down the poor kid’s kite, defeating him in this invisible war-like game.

The rich kid turns to wonder what he should do next – his luxurious life acts heavily on him as he is hardly interested in playing anything, getting distracted every time to hop on the other toy train.

Though the rich kid thought he had won the game, he notices how the poor kid has gone back to his first toy – the bamboo flute. The rich kid in his big mansion with barred windows, ample toys and other luxuries feels confused in the end.

Analysis

A chance encounter between a rich and poor child that quickly moves from a childish display of their toys to a game of power politics, Ray’s fable presents a strong image of a divided and degraded society.

The film shows the truth of inequality – nurtured by greed, leading to decadence – revealing how the class that suffers the most is the one which invariably suffers to simply survive.

India in the 60s, apart from facing many internal problems, also fought wars with China (in 1962) and Pakistan (in 1965), thus, impacting the overall growth of the new nation. Two: A Film Fable highlights this stunted growth by showing the disparity between the two kids, reminding people about their responsibilities as a free citizen of a free nation.

The rich kid is not just rich, he is self-indulgent and hedonistic; home alone after attending his birthday party, he saunters around in the big empty home, drinking Coca-Cola, chewing bubble-gum, not sure which toy, out of the lot, he should play with. Meanwhile, the poor kid is playing his bamboo flute, walking round and round outside his hut, not minding the glaring sun.

Bamboo flute vs. toy trumpet, small drum vs. battery-powered monkey drummer toy, a mask, bow and arrow vs. couple of fancy masks, swords, spears and guns – both the kids don’t realise participating in power politics as they don’t understand it, but because they belong to such different classes, separated by a giant gap, their casual showing-off game inadvertently turns into power politics.

When the poor child comes back and quietly starts to fly a kite, the rich kid – who was till now looking down at the poor kid from his first-floor window – looks up at the sky, surprised to see the poor kid’s kite soaring high. Wondering, he gets his toy rifle and shoots down the kite. The rich kid is unabashedly happy about his actions here.

Satisfied now, the rich kid goes back to playing with his toys, switching every automatic toy on simultaneously, making a lot of noise, over which he soon hears the poor kid’s flute once again. While the poor kid calmly plays the flute, the rich kid stands still looking nonplussed.

In a very subtle manner Ray’s film criticises the class politics, the capitalist outlook and booming culture of consumerism by portraying how these ideologies sink in the society affecting one and all and especially instilling flawed values in the children.

Today these two kids – who are still very much present as the disparity has only intensified – will not have such an encounter through the window anymore, thanks to the mobile phones and social media age.

The adults have joined too for they started the big game, everyone’s playing it, my toys vs your toys. And whosoever wins, not knowing what else to do, restarts the game.

And the fable continues…

Weekly Newsletter

Recent Posts

Regina Spektor’s Musical World and Addressing the Hero – Part IV

Posted on February 20, 2022 by Jagriti Rumi Apres Moi Boorish Brainwashed Darkness February Golden Retirement Inequality Musical World Pasternak Regina Spektor Russian Poem Sky Small Bills The Hero Thieves Time Unconsciously Us

Coverage

The hero is in hiding, asleep, has forgotten or has been brainwashed because only that could explain the hero’s silence; the dead silence is complementing the darkness ostentatiously.

And no surprise, right? This darkness is overwhelming, too huge, so vast, damn cruel, heartless/soulless, steady and conniving that the heroes have all locked themselves up in the epics, legends and myths.

Dejected and weak they have turned their backs, criticising the critics, they hopelessly work to earn a living, measuring their quiet success every fiscal year, waiting for the golden retirement when they will finally wake up… or maybe they will not.

Regina Spektor is calling out to all the heroes to wake up, rise and fight, to accept the responsibilities of actions they so unconsciously take, to wage a war against inequality one little step at a time.

Listen to Apres Moi before reading further –

I (uh) must go on standing
You can’t break that which isn’t yours
I (uh) must go on standing
I’m not my own, it’s not my choice

Be afraid of the lame, they’ll inherit your legs
Be afraid of the old, they’ll inherit your souls
Be afraid of the cold, they’ll inherit your blood
Apres moi le deluge, after me comes the flood…
Regina Spektor

Revolutions, the downfall of monarchies, totalitarian leaders, genocides… mankind’s history is a presence in the absence, it is ever-looming, reminding us of the foundation on which we are now building smart castles (with Alexa or Google Nest Hub or the gadget you prefer).

Apres moi le deluge is a French phrase that means ‘after me, the flood’ and is attributed to Louis XV of France; one of the explanations suggest its nihilistic connotation that says, ‘Ruin, if you like, when we are dead and gone’ and the other links it with Halley’s comet and the impending French Revolution of 1789.

Here, Regina Spektor talks about the far-reaching presence of history and how we cannot ignore it for long.

She sings a few lines of a Russian poem when reaching the crescendo; it is a poem by Nobel laureate Boris Pasternak, titled ‘February’ –

Black spring! Pick up your pen, and weeping,
Of February, in sobs and ink,
Write poems, while the slush in thunder
Is burning in the black of spring.
Translated by Lydia Pasternak Slater, Boris’s sister

An intense song that resonates across and holds your thoughts, it seems as if the song is urging us folks to stand up against the odds without delay, asking us folks not to mellow down.

Listen to Us –

They made a statue of us
They made a statue of us
The tourists come and stare at us
The sculptor’s mama sends regards
They made a statue of us
They made a statue of us
Our noses have begun to rust
We’re living in a den of thieves
Rummaging for answers in the pages
We’re living in a den of thieves
And it’s contagious
And it’s contagious…
Regina Spektor

Thieves are untied clandestinely, inconspicuously, invincibly, heartily like no other group on this planet, working religiously, solely for their profit.

The one charismatic, luring fact, among other things, is the freedom they give to every individual thief, showing no concern for each other, but keeping a check and standing in solidarity if the deal is profitable.

Regina Spektor rightly diagnosed this behaviour as contagious; the song is giving a warning, it is a reminder. Wake up dear heroes, at least to rub off the rust on your noses.

Listen to Small Bills –

His destiny was just too big to spend
So he broke it into smaller bills and change
By the time he’d try to buy the things he needed
He had spent it all on Lucy’s and weed and
He had spent it all on chips and Coca-Cola
He had spent it all on chocolate and vanilla
He had spent it all and didn’t even feel it…
Regina Spektor

May the heroes win the peculiar, surreal, boorish individual battles that they are fighting again and again and again.

Listen to Hero –

Hey, open wide, here comes
Original sin
(Vrrr)
Hey, open wide, here comes
Original sin
It’s alright, it’s alright
It’s alright, it’s alright…
I’m the hero of the story
Don’t need to be saved…
Regina Spektor

Listen to this song when the sky is orange-pink, dimly twinkling, armouring up for the dark night; listen to this song when the sky is whitish-blue, brightly warm, breathing lightly, gently healing the hero.