Aba as History?

Ravi PERERA

ABA, Jackson Anthony’s historical drama based on the early days of the Sinhala Kingdom is presently showing at our cinemas. Considering the obscure nature of the historical events portrayed, the film is a reasonably mature effort and evidently well received by our filmgoers.

In the modern context the story is melodramatic to say the least. The King has ten sons and one extremely beautiful daughter. A seer foretells that one day she will beget a son who will kill the uncles and gain the Kingdom. Such prophesies are not to be disregarded and the uncles, without exception, demand the death of their sister. A compromise solution is negotiated by the King who to ensure her virtue confines the daughter to a well-guarded tower. But love finds a way, apparently in the guiles of a taciturn “Prince” from a vanquished tribe who has been provided accommodation in the King’s palace.

Soon the princess’s condition is discovered and the uncles in order to cheat the prophecy demand the death of the newborn if it turns out to be a male. Swords unsheathed they stand anxiously outside the birth-chamber. Killing the baby if necessary was obviously within their power. But the mother to be with the active assistance of the Queen had hatched a plan to mislead the brothers. On an old mat in the corner of the chamber is lowly female servant also pregnant who times her baby perfectly with that of the Princess.

Of course, the Princess gives birth to a boy while quite conveniently the servant begets a daughter. The Queen walks out and displays the baby girl of the servant to her sons who withdraw reassured. The Queen and others in the know then take steps to smuggle out of the palace her grandson who it is prophesied would one day kill her own sons to gain the Kingdom.

A modern day historian might find many parallels between the bombastic and impotent violence of the ten brothers and that of our subsequent evolutionary progress. Here they were with the power of life and death over all living beings around them while their mother and sister smuggle out under their very noses the future nemesis. It did not occur to any of the brothers to observe or have observed the childbirth of their sister first hand, an event crucial for their well-being. Nor could they conceive of a firm cordon around the tower in which their sister was kept in custody.

But later their suspicions aroused the brothers vengefully demand the head of the suspected lover of their sister. For some reason the intrepid lover of the Princess is treated in a quasi-spiritual manner. His beheading and in fact many other scenes in the film are strongly reminiscent of powerful films like Ben Hur, Ten Commandments and Passion of Jesus Christ. Even the heavens are moved and the rain comes pouring down terrifying even the hardened executioner. It is also noteworthy that like in those Hollywood epics ABA too puts its main villains in saddle, many centuries before the animal was introduced to this island, paying no heed to the fact that even to this day we are not natural riders.

Periodically the uncles receive information that their nephew is growing up safe in a shepherd’s village. They react with predictable but utterly incompetent brutality, indiscriminately killing young boys of similar age. All the King’s men and all the King’s horses cannot outwit the simple villagers who sacrifice their own to protect the supposed “Prince” in their care.

Of course here various apparitions and magic men play their role helping his protectors to cheat the corporeal powers of the uncles. The storyteller himself seems to admit that the plausibility of his tale depends very much on our belief that supernatural powers do intervene actively in matters of men.

The film is itself is entertaining if taken as drama. But is it history? The producer in an interview makes the point “ It was a matriarchal society. Women were able to defend themselves. Habara cannot touch Gumbakabootha until she gives him consent. Today men strangle women and drag them under a bush...” He is talking about the same era where the sons of the King can kill with impunity. Their sister survived only by leave of her father, the King. If we were to adopt the same yardstick and portray just one couple today would their private conduct represent the standards of million other living men and women ? Which couple can we confidently take as representing the norms of the present society? History surely cannot be interpreted in this simplistic manner.

We tend to accept a scene in which the actors speak in the jargon of an era as representing the essence of the times. Even at a cursory glance men then were absolutely feudal and utterly superstitious. In them there is no inclination to “political” action unless leadership is provided by royal “blood”. It was as natural as breathing to debase themselves in front of royalty. Every phenomenon is an omen to be read and interpreted by “wise” men. Naturally when grappling with such subjects an artist is extremely challenged, particularly when he has to divine the thoughts and responses of men who lived in such faraway times. Were they civilized philosophers, noble savages, cringing vassals, ignorant rabble or a little bit of every thing? How did men, invariably illiterate, respond to the harsh social stimuli that they were routinely subject to?

In such a context how reliable are mostly self-congratulatory records kept by the precious few who were able to put hammer and chisel to stone?

But as Jackson Anthony points out in such matters debate can go on indefinitely. We must congratulate the producer for provoking an interest in the public of an era as well as issues, which are far removed from their daily struggles.