Mira Nair is unabashed about the subject of her fourth feature, Kama Sutra, the first film she's shot in India since her widely acclaimed debut, Salaam Bombay! As the title of the new film that of India's handbook of the arts of love implies, Kama Sutra is a film about love and eroticism. But it is not eroticism as understood by the cinema of the West, which Nair sums up as 'Sharon Stone uncrossing her legs in Basic Instinct!'
'Erotic,' she continues, 'is now revealing flesh in your first scene and humping along to the end. But then, what can you expect from a cinema culture that finds rape acceptable dramatically, but not the depiction of the glorious sex act itself?'
Nair's film is set in 16th century India, and centres on the rivalry between Tara, a noble princess (Sarita Choudhury, star of Nair's second film, Mississippi Masala), and Maya, a beautiful servant girl (Indira Varma, a London-trained actress making her screen debut).
While Tara is married to the great king Raj Singh (Naveen Andrews, star of The Buddha of Suburbia and soon to be seen in the film version of The English Patient), Maya is relegated to the background and plots revenge, which she eventually achieves by means of an erotic statue of her carved by Jai, the court sculptor (Ramon Tikaram, who is scheduled to play the title role in Nair's currently postponed film, Buddha).
'I didn't want to make a simple lecture on the lack of spirituality in contemporary society,' insists Nair. 'I had a far wickeder and much naughtier interest in mind, too. We all get love wrong, but we could so easily get love right if we listened and learned from the ancient texts that used to be inbred in all Indian women from the age of ten.
'That's what Kama Sutra is about: learning from past traditions. The past is the best mirror to reflect our future.'
Prod co: Mirabal Films, for NDF International, Pony Canyon, Pandora Film, in association with Channel Four Films
Prod: Mira Nair, Lydia Dean Pilcher
Dir: Mira Nair.
Guión (Scr): Helena Kriel, Mira Nair
Foto (Ph): Declan Quinn
Art dir (Prod des): Mark Friedberg
Mont (Ed): Kristina Boden
Ints (Cast): Sarita Choudhury, Naveen Andrews, Ramon Tikaram, Indira Varma, Pekha
Ventas (Sales): CiBy Sales
Programación (Screening): 12.00, 27 Sept, Victoria Eugenia; 18.00, 27 Sept, Victoria Eugenia; 23.00, 27 Sept, Astoria 1; 18.15, 28 Sept, Astoria 3
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