Thinking activity Midnight's Children Film Adaptation:
Hello friends,
Here I'm gonna write this blog on the Film adaptation of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children , so let's start…
Introduction:
Salman Rushdie
Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie FRSL is an Indian-born British-American novelist and essayist.His work, combining magical realism with historical fiction, is primarily concerned with the many connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and Western civilizations, with much of his fiction being set on the Indian subcontinent.more
Points to ponder :
Narrative technique ( changes made in film adaptation - for eg. absence of Padma, the Nati , the listener, the commenter - What is your interpretation ? )
Rushdie employees the technique of the first personnarrative in Midnight's Children. The characters are introduced long before they actually appear in the novel. It creates suspense in the mind of the readers
In the opening scenes we can observe differences in the way the versions address the
audience: the novel’s narrator uses the first person to provide, in a deferred and rounda-
bout way, his story; in the film, there is also direct speech, but the narrative proceeds
much more unswervingly. The other two versions do not construct a rapport with the
audience in such a straightforward way by direct address.there is absence of the character of Padma who is the listener of the story in the film The novel and the film thus seem to initially create a more personal rapport with their
constructed audiences. It is significant in this respect that the character of Padma, the
novel’s original immediate addressee and audience the person who listens to and com
ments on Saleem’s narrative, and the second main character in the novel, after the pro
tagonist is included in the first two adaptations, but in the film she is supplanted by
Rushdie’s voiceover. Padma’s role in the film was originally offered to the actor Nandita
Das, who had worked with Mehta in Fire and Earth, but Das abandoned the project for personal reasons (Garfinkel, 2009; IBNLive, 2011). Rather than looking for a substitute
for the role of Padma, this setback was compensated by introducing the voiceover. The
choice has been regarded variously as a success and a failure by critics, for example,
from the gender perspective. There are indeed grounds for interpreting the substitution of
a female voice with a male as problematic; this change may even be attributed to the
authorial ego. However that may be, it creates a fundamental difference between the
versions.
With respect to the impact on reception of having the author in Padma’s role, the use
of Rushdie’s voice for the narration has received mixed reviews.
Characters ( How many included , how many left out - why ? What is your interpretation ? )
The characters of the film Midnight's Children and the novel Midnight's Children are some way different , became in the film some minor characters were absent .
According to the Novel Midnight's Children , there is in the novel characters are...
Aadam Aziz is a doctor and the father of Amina Sinai, or Mumtaz, Saleem's mother.
Aadam Aziz's Mother runs the jewel business of her husband. She is often shrewd toward Aadam.
Aadam Aziz's Father is a formerly successful jewel merchant, whose mentality has now declined.
Tai is a boatman on Dal Lake and a friend of Aadam Aziz.
Naseem Ghani is the daughter of the wealthy landlord Ghani. She is first Aadam Aziz's patient and then becomes his wife.
Ghani the landowner is Naseem's father. He owns a lot of property around Dal Lake in Kashmir.
Oskar Lubin is a German anarchist friend of Doctor Aziz from his student days in Heidelberg, Germany.
Ilse Lubin is Oskar's wife and another anarchist friend of Aadam Aziz from his student days in Heidelberg.
Ingrid another anarchist friend in Heidelberg.
Brigadier R. E. Dyer, an officer in the British army and Martial Law Commander of Amritsar who orders his men to fire on an unarmed crowd. An actual historical event and personage, see Reginald Dyer.
Alia is the eldest daughter of Aadam and Naseem Aziz; she is the sister of Amina Sinai (Mumtaz) and Emerald.
Amina Sinai (a.k.a. Mumtaz) is the middle daughter of Aadam and Naseem Aziz.
Mian Abdullah (Also known as the Hummingbird) is a pro-Indian Muslim political figure, who dies at the hands of assassins.
The Rani of Cooch Naheen a wealthy Muslim woman who sponsors the political campaign of the Hummingbird.
Nadir Khan is Mumtaz's first husband. He is "the Hummingbird's" personal secretary, and is known for his rhymeless poetry.
Hammdard the rickshawman is a rickshaw servant who lives behind Aadam and Naseem's house.
Rashid the rickshaw boy is the son of Hammdard. He lives behind Aadam and Naseem's house.
Emerald the youngest and prettiest daughter of Aadam and Naseem Aziz; she is Saleem's aunt, the sister of Mumtaz. She marries General Zulfikar.
General Zulfikar is the husband of Emerald, who is involved with Pakistani political events. Is described as having a face like Pulcinella.
Ahmed Sinai is Saleem's father and Amina's husband. He is originally a dealer in leathercloth, but becomes a property speculator when he moves to Bombay.
Lifafa Das is a peep show street man who leads Amina to Shri Ramram Seth in gratitude after she saves his life from a Muslim mob.
Shri Ramram Seth is a Hindu seer, a cousin of Lifafa Das.
William Methwold is an Englishman from whom the Sinais buy their house in Breach Candy, Bombay.
Wee Willie Winkie is an accordionist and entertainer. He is Shiva's non biological father, and Vanita's husband.
Vanita is the wife of Wee Willie Winkie; she is revealed to be Saleem's biological mother, who dies during labor.
Mary Pereira is a midwife and servant, who switches Shiva and Saleem at birth in an attempt at impressing her sweetheart Joseph D'Costa.
Joseph D'Costa is Mary Pereira's sweetheart, a hospital porter, a communist political radical and a most wanted man by the Indian police.
Suresh
Narlikar is a child hating gynecologist and businessman, who lives on Methwold's Estate in Bombay.
Doctor Bose is the doctor who delivers Saleem.
Ibrahim Ibrahim a next door neighbor in Sans Souci villa on Methwold's Estate in Bombay.
Ismail Ibrahim' a neighbour to the Sinai's who is a crooked lawyer.
Nussie Ibrahim, Ismail's wife, who is nicknamed The Duck because of the way she walks.
Ishaq Ibrahim, a hotel owner lives with his father and brother on the Methwold's Estate.
Adi Dubash A nuclear physicist who works on India's nuclear program.
Mrs Dubash, his wife who is a religious fanatic.
Cyrus the Great the Dubashes only son and childhood friend of Saleem's.
Sonny Ibrahim is Saleem's neighbour and friend.
Eyeslice Sabarmati one of Saleem's childhood friends on Methwold's Estate, the son of Commander Sabarmati and his wife Lila, and the brother of Hairoil.
Shiva is a boy who is born at the same moment as Saleem.
Thus, according to this character list of the novel Midnight's Children we find in the film Midnight's Children , there is lot many absence of the minor characters , but in this absence of the minor characters my interpretation is that for me it is good to watch the film instead of reading whole novel , because the film contains entire idea of the novel through some main Characters.
Themes and Symbols ( If film adaptation able to capture themes and symbols)
In this concept of Themes and Symbols I want to say , yes . For the film Midnight's Children's use of symbols and themes.
Truth and Storytelling:
Self-proclaimed writer and pickle-factory manager Saleem Sinai is dying—cracking and crumbling under the stress of a mysterious illness—but before he does, he is determined to tell his story. With the “grand hope of the pickling of time,” Saleem feverishly pens his autobiography, preserving his stories like jars of chutney, searching for truth and meaning within them.
British Colonialism and Postcolonialism:
Born at exactly midnight on the eve of India’s independence from British colonialism, Saleem Sinai is the first free native citizen born on Indian soil in nearly a hundred years.
After a century of British rule, in addition to a century of unofficial imperialism before that, Saleem’s birth marks the end of a two-hundred-year British presence in India.
Sex and Gender:
Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children is a harsh critique of the gender-related power struggles of postcolonial Indian society. After generations of purdah—the belief that Muslim and Hindu women should live separately from society,
behind a curtain or veil, to stay out of the sight of men—postcolonial women are encouraged to become “modern Indian women” and remove their veils.
Identity and Nationality:
From the moment Saleem Sinai is born on the eve of India’s independence from Great Britain, he becomes the living embodiment of his country.
Saleem is India, and his identity metaphorically represents the identity of an entire nation; however, Saleem’s identity is complicated and conflicted. A nation, generally understood as the same people living in the same place, only loosely applies to India’s diverse population.
Fragments and Partitioning:
Following their 1947 independence from British rule, India begins to break up in a process known as partitioning. British India splits along religious lines, forming the Muslim nation of Pakistan and the secular, but mostly Hindu,
nation of India. India continues to fracture even further, dividing itself based on language and class. Meanwhile, Saleem Sinai, the living embodiment of India,
Religion:
Religion is at the forefront of Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children, and it drives most of the narrative throughout the entire novel.
Saleem Sinai, the narrator-protagonist, is born Muslim but lives most of his life in the Hindu-steeped culture of Bombay.
His lifelong ayah, Mary Pereira, is a devout Catholic, and his sister, the Brass Monkey, ultimately joins a nunnery.
it is a major cause of the civil unrest following India’s independence. Suppressed under British rule, freedom of religion is a fundamental right under India’s new constitution, and it has saturated society.
The texture of the novel ( What is the texture of the novel?) Well , it is the interconnectedness of narrative technique with the theme is it well captured ?)
Midnight’s Children moves at more grandiose levels. The grand destiny of the great Nation is
reflected in that of Midnight children, the children born at the midnight hour of August 15th,
1947. The chief protagonist Saleem Sinai finds himself “mysteriously handcuffed to history”. The texture of this novel is allusive, complex and inclusive dense with
symbolic, even emblematic overtones.
Multiple identities and shifting shapes of people, things
and institutions are vividly depicted epitomized at the stage where the two most important
characters Saleem and Shiva become indistinguishable. Even national frontiers and nationalities
get blurred. Xenophobic pride like dark mist is cover over realities. It is the composite picture of
India where all distinctions of races, communities, classes, regions and religions become non-
existent, one qualifying and affecting other.
Rushdie burlesques historical names
giving comic slighting effect to high-flying idealism, thus bringing the focus on the mud
and froth of real existence. He also gives touches of genial satire on superstitious practices
in the belief of astrology and other esoteric devices. At the age of nine Saleem discovers his
extraordinary telepathic powers enabling him to read the mind of people around him. At ten
he begins communicating with 581 children who are the survivors from 1001 children born at
the Great Midnight.
Saleem Sinai the supposed
son of Ahmed and Amina is legally the son of poor singer Wee Willie Winkie though reality is
still unclear. The singer’s wife Vanita had an illicit relation with an English land-lord, William
Methwold. The midwife Mary Pereira somehow changed the name tags of Vanita and Amina’s
babies and thus he became an offspring of the Sinai household.
But, from my point of view, it captures everything in the movie well.
What is your aesthetic experience after watching the screening ?
Independence, Partition, Emergency, the bloodbath and injustice in their wake, and the human vicissitudes in this span ‘pre-1947 to the 1970s’ totalling these grinders of history—Deepa Mehta’s Midnight’s Children, the screenplay and original book written by Salman Rushdie, is a staggering story to film.
In the late 1980s, after reading Rushdie’s book, auteur Satyajit Ray had famously said, “It would be unfilmable in the sense that it would have to be simplified so much it would not be itself." Rushdie, an admirer of Ray, had approached the film-maker to direct one of the numerous attempts to translate the book on to screen, as a six-part TV series. But Ray declined because, as he said in the same interview, “It has so much of the current, so much of contemporary politics." Mehta’s interpretation takes the illustrious Midnight’s Children legacy a bit forward, but does not make us see Saleem Sinai’s world in an unforgettable way, shattering our own imaginings of this busy and dense world. Her Midnight’s Children is worth a watch because, besides a few episodic sparkles, it urges us to revisit the book, and find the sweat and specks of Rushdie’s narrative.
Thank you…
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