Unspoken promise of a better tomorrow

Ruwini JAYAWARDANA

Award winning filmmaker Deepa Metha’s Heaven on Earth is a story of the despairing plight of a young wife on the first go but it has hope and survival embedded into the folds of its plot.

The movie details the ill fated arranged marriage of a vibrant young Panjabi girl named Chand and her temperamental Canadian husband, Rocky. The movie opens with the party bidding goodbye to Chand’s single life back in India.

Next it shows the blushing young bride getting ready to meet her husband and his family in Toronto. Metha sets the tone of the production from then on, projecting the discomfort and off-putting nature of Chand’s spouse and his family.

Our hunch is proven correct through Rocky’s domineering mother. His father is good natured but too mild to control his children and wife’s behaviour. Rocky’s sister and her family too depend on Rocky to look after their needs. The eldest child is prone to playing pranks while the youngest is too little to be of any comfort to Chand. Her husband is cold and distant and seems to notice her only to vent out his anger.

Desperate to contact her family in India and with no one to talk to Chand turns to her factory fellow worker, Jamaican born Rosa, for help. Her friend sees past Chand’s attempts to hide her bruises and gives her a root saying that it a magic potion which will make whoever drinks it fall hopelessly in love with her.

Though her first attempt backfires, Chand begins to have visions of a cobra in her backyard and with these hallucinations Rocky’s role too seems to change from a tyrant to a protector.

Mehta normally engages a lot of imagery in her movies. Heaven on Earth is no exception. From the moment that it is indicated that the merriment is limited to the opening scenes and the images shift to a

darker and gloomier atmosphere we realize that joy is short lived. The shift of the coloured scenes to black and white display the moment that Chand imagines what could have taken place had things been just as she hoped in her marriage.

However unlike her previous works, the imagery in ‘Heaven on Earth’ seems overdone. Mehta follows her regular beat in questioning family values and cultural norms in Heaven on Earth as well. One such instance is when one character of the movie says that hell is better than a heaven without dignity.

However unlike in movies like Fire, the universal quality of Heaven on Earth is evident for it centers on domestic violence away from an Asian set up, via a immigrant family living in a western country. No matter where they live, in most communities, women are meant to obey physical wrath with silence.

Many other movie makers have dealt with the theme of domestic violence in their movies so it is inevitable that Heaven of Earth would be compared with them.

Though it has often been weighted against Jag Mundhra’s Provoked starring Aishwarya Rai and Naveen Andrews, one look at Heaven on Earth makes you realize that this is a story that stands on its own.

The only common factor they possess is that both are very disturbing films on the plight of women who had to leave their native country and make a living with their husbands. ‘Heaven on Earth’ also deals with a mythical element via the cobra’s tale.

The star of the show is no doubt Preity Zinta who gives a stellar performance as the battered housewife, Chand. Vansh Bhardwaj too brings depth to Rocky’s character. Both lead actors do well in bringing uniqueness to characters which could easily have fallen into stereotypes.

For instance instead of playing the wounded victim, Zinta’s character tries to understand and rehab her husband against all odds. Similarly Bhardwaj proves that Rocky is not entirely a villain.

He does display his softer side in rare instances. This may not be Metha’s best work but the movie is worth a watch for its cast’s yeoman effort and its unique storyline.