Official Synopsis:
Winner of two 1984 Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actress (Peggy Ashcroft) and Best Score, as well as the Golden Globe winner for Best Foreign Film, Oscar-winning director David Lean (1962, Lawrence of Arabia; 1957, The Bridge on the River Kwai) masterfully adapts E.M. Forster’s novel of political tensions in colonial India.  Two-time Oscar nominee Judy Davis (1984, Best Actress, A Passage to India; 1992. Best Supporting Actress, Husbands and Wives) stars as Adela Quested, a plucky young woman who journeys from England with the free-spirited Mrs. Moore (Ashcroft).  Flouting convention, the two women accompany the handsome Dr. Aziz on a tour of the mysterious Marabar Caves.  But, things turn ugly when Adela returns scratched and bloodied from the expedition.  As British authorities urge her to press charges against Aziz, the line separating truth and fantasy begins to blur – and nothing is quite what it seems.

  
Our Take:
A Passage to India, David Lean’s final film, looks like a tourist’s brochure, but with the undercurrent of social unrest far more palpable.  Much like Jean Renoir (The River) and Wes Anderson (The Darjeeling Limited) after him, Lean captures the beauty of India perfectly and with a level of depth that always serves as thematic reinforcement.  For example, in one of the mostly beautifully shot scenes, Mrs. Moore (Peggy Ashcroft) is looking out on the Ganges in the moonlight admiring its beauty when Dr. Aziz (Victor Banerjee) informs her that he occasionally sees dead bodies floating down the river, but not too often because the crocodiles usually eat them.  In that single scene, Lean sums up the entire movie and our viewing experience.  India is the Ganges; we look at its beauty on the screen just as Ms. Quested (Judy Davis) and Mrs. Moore view India upon their arrival, tending to ignore the “crocodiles” lurking beneath the surface, the social unrest and second-class citizenry of the Indian people under England’s imperial occupation.  Lean comes back to the moonlit Ganges and we briefly see a crocodile rise to the surface; the Indian people’s outrage rises to the surface of the film in its second half. 

The greatest strength of this film is the confidence it has in its own story and in the audience to be intelligent enough to grasp it. A Passage to India could have easily devolved into a simplistic white man’s burden film (see: Edward Zwick) and it is a credit to both David Lean and E.M. Forster that it did not.  Imperialism is a tricky beast best illustrated in a scene from Monty Python’s The Life of Brian when the leader of the Judean People’s Front exclaims, “Name one thing the Romans have ever done for us?”  and the followers go on to list a variety of quality of life improvements.  It is inevitable that there will be positive and negatives to every imperial occupation, but in the more simplistic film we get “Imperialism is bad” hammered over and over so we get a bright line of good guys (the oppressed, occupied people), bad guys (the imperialists), and former bad but now good guys (i.e.: Tom Cruise in The Last Samurai).  This film actually has all of these characters, but things are not that simple.  There are shifting loyalties, bitter resentments, misunderstandings and reconciliations between the various main characters.  It is this depth of character that makes A Passage to India (and most David Lean films) stay away from the emotionally manipulative trappings of similarly themed films.

A Passage to India looks better than it ever has before thanks to Sony’s high definition remastering of the film, which, along with a second disc of extras, makes this new 2-disc Collector’s Edition a deserving upgrade over the 2001 DVD of the film.  The extras contained here include:

Disc 1

* Commentary with Producer Richard Goodwin.

Disc 2

* E.M. Forster: Profile of an Author (7 minutes).

* An Epic Takes Shape (11 minutes).

* An Indian Affair (14 minutes).

* Only Connect: A Vision of India (11 minutes).

* Casting a Classic (12 minutes).

* David Lean: Shooting with the Master (14 minutes).

* Reflections of David Lean (8 minutes) – This was the lone extra on the 2001 release of the film; it’s nice to see it was carried over here

A Passage to India: Collector’s Edition is a beautiful presentation of a beautifully shot film.  Based on the quality of this standard definition release, those with the capabilities may want to opt for the Blu-ray release instead.  Lean’s lush visuals are finally done justice thanks to Sony’s high definition remastering.  Fans of David Lean or even fans of filmmakers like Edward Zwick craving more depth should certainly check out this excellent film.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

Overall Picture:
Movie: A
DVD:  A

- Matthew Orlando
Staff Writer