The photographs, visual communication posters with graphics and leaflets prepared for advertising the film are artistic. These are creations of applied art that quickly attract the spectators. The trailer, which is the abbreviation of the film, is also highly edited to motivate the spectator to watch the movie. Albaroda took part in the 2021 Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF). The theme of this film festival was “Crossing the Boarders”.
Judgemental review
Judgemental review is to come to a decision on a work or a creation based on an accepted criteria system relevant to the subject. This also includes judging the plus points (value) as well as its weaknesses. Sometimes a blind review is taken where the work or creation is judged without knowing the name of the creator or the author of the work. Though these reviews make artists, researchers who present post graduate thesis's and papers and also authors that are uncomfortable, this method helps to develop their professional skills on the subject.
These scientific methodologies help to deepen the spectator’s knowledge and to develop his acquaintance with the true essence of things. It also acts as a supporter to the development of a creator’s next creation or the betterment of the art field.
In this method the judge does not consider the author’s status or the relationship with him but only his work or the creation to arrive at his conclusions and to give the final decision regarding the work.
The International Jury Boards use a similar method and a goal regarding art too. These evaluations can be called positive, constructive criticism. From this kind of criticism, the work or the creator will not be raised to a false exaltation and also will not deceive the creator or the spectators.
If a method is followed where the maximum mark will be given at the beginning of the judgement and then based on the weaknesses that mark will decrease step by step, the work that retains the maximum mark will come up as the best. This criticism is being written taking into consideration the local audience and imagining why none of the awards were given to the film Alborada by the TIFF Jury. I thank the director of the film for inviting me to the first screening of the film, which was held on 6.12.2021 for the reviewers and writers. Though I wrote this review soon after watching the film I delayed it until the film is released to the public.
Titles at the beginning
A film is an art that is made up of photographs and a series of motion figures as its main foundation. Additional arts such as music, sounds and background set ups are elements which intensify the expression of the story line. A spectator moves into a film and gets caught in it by reading it visually.
Alborada begins with a woman attired in a red cloth swaying underwater. The angles of the camera operate under the water. The red cloth is loosened by the movements of the woman and it floats freely under the water exposing her bare legs and thighs. The composition of this scene is high and is similar to a watercolour painting with smudged paints. The scene spread entirely around the screen and it attracts the spectator with curiosity and voyeurism, whether her whole nudity will be shown on screen or not.
This happens towards the left side of the screen covering a large range. The titles are unfolding on the bottom of the right side of the screen. The spectator has no interest in reading the titles because of the curiosity that he has about the woman. Hence the foremost aim of the titles scenery falls apart.
If a strategic plan had been followed, such as stilling the moving figure while the titles are falling on the screen and while changing the titles, strongly smudging the figure or changing close up scenes to a long shot, the due attention to the titles could have been given and the aim of the titles could have been protected.
Symbols
As I see it there are three main symbols used in this movie. The first one is the Parvati sculpture which gets the attention of Pablo as soon as he enters his Sri Lankan home for the first time. This sculpture has very little artistic value and has been created in recent times. The faces of South Indian historical sculptures of goddesses are highly stylistic.
The Parvati sculpture we see at the film does not come even close to the divine moods of these goddesses. The rhythmic eyes, sharp noses, the 3D flow of the lips, typical for traditional South Indian bronze sculptures are nowhere to be seen in this figure.
Likewise, special characteristics of traditional sculptures fully formed sensitive breasts, extremely thin waist and wide hips, also cannot be seen here. Free standing posture with plastic rhythm expressed with three bends rhythm (Thribhanga) and forms of legs which could be clearly seen from under the soft cloth are special characteristics of ancient sculptures. But instead of these characteristics a Parvati roughly created in an artificial way has been used in this film. Bronze antique statues are not polished so as to show the gold colour.
Ancient sculptures, which are in gold, are actually gilded gold. All ancient bronze statues are covered with a green patina which grows and lives on them. There is no way that the statue in the film belongs to the year 1930.
This weakness has greatly affected the film for its drawback. In the beginning itself, this makes Pablo a character with a low taste in sculpture. After his demise, the house he had lived in has been turned into a museum in Chile with a collection of art works, photographs and writings which he had collected over the years from various countries.
From this collection one can clearly see his artistic sense, especially his interest and literacy in sculpture. Neruda had a good discourse with world renown painters like Diego Rivera (1886-1957) Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and also while he lived in Sri Lanka with Justin Pieris Deraniyagala (1903-1967) and George Keyt (1901-1993). His real visual appreciation becomes faded because of this reason and it may have been a challenge to the film. Therefore the film becomes compressed and Neruda’s true character rises like a giant.
If the world famous book Bronzes from Ceylon, chiefly in Colombo Museum- 1914 by Dr. Ananda K. Coomaraswamy (1877-1947) was studied regarding the sculptures of South Indian female deities before making the film, this situation could have been avoided.
This feeble figure testifies to the fact that the previous research study, which should have been done before making the film, had been evaded. According to the height and the volume of the statue, if it is a metal statue, it could never be lifted by a single person. The body language of the person who lifts the statue shows that this statue was made of plaster of paris or a light material like fiberglass, and painted gold similar to the gold statues we see in recent times. In the 1930s no statues were made with such cheap material.
A painted wooden mask which is a distinctive item in Sri Lankan traditional dances seems to be the next symbol. Chasing a child wearing a Nagaraksha mask on the opposite side of his face for a long time makes one tired. This same child with the Naga Raksha mask is shown at the end of the film with Neruda at the beach. It’s not clear for what reason this symbol has been used.
If the director had tried to show Neruda’s psychological status by using the mask, several questions would arise from this. The Naga Raksha mask is used in ancient traditional performing arts to create entertainment. It’s a mask to express a clash between a gurula and a snake. If not, simply bringing a child who sells masks to tourists to the screen at the beginning, and again at the end is questionable.
According to the time taken for these scenes and the two special occasions it’s shown, it is clear that the director is trying to express a specific meaning. But what he attempts in trying to connect it with the concept of the film is not cinematically clear. This mask is a folk artwork created to combine mythological, demonical animal spirit and the human figure. That this mask belongs to Sri Lankan rituals, dramas and folk theatre is very well known around the world.
Third symbol
The third symbol is the red saree which was shown at the title scenery, dressed on Parvati, and also Neruda is running, dragging the saree as a kite along the beach, and tearing it.
From all these incidents, it seems as if the director tries to show the mentality of Neruda. These are presented in a realistic cinematic style. Instead, if it was shown in a surrealistic or an abstract visual language, it would have been more cinematic and would have carried the film more closely to the expected goal.
Instead of imagining scenes or dreams the way they are expressed in cinematic language, the director shows Jossie threatening to kill Neruda in a realistic grammatical order. When the servant comes running because of Neruda’s screams he says that he was dreaming. This whole scene neglects the artistic structure in showing dreams on screen. It affects the artistic pattern of the film.
Pablo was famous as a poet, even in 1930. The character in the film looks tired, stressed and mentally exhausted from the beginning of the film.
The film has highlighted Neruda’s character more as an officer addicted to alcohol and a womaniser instead of an ambassador designated to Ceylon representing Chile during colonial times.
While Jossie is hunting for love from him, he gets scared of her violence, then he forces himself on an innocent Sakkili woman. This part was never written by Pablo Neruda in his ‘Memoirs’. This part is highly exaggerated and reconstructed. A sexually violent character is imposed on Pablo Neruda because of this reason.
It’s a strategy in contemporary cinema to use themes such as, sexual behaviours and sexual violence to attract the public. It’s a question whether Alborada too was a prey to that tendency.
The scenes of Pablo washing his latrine, going towards the sea with a broom and a bucket of waste on his head and the elderly Sakkili woman laughing sarcastically at him has been shown in a realistic cinema language. But if he had tried to show Pablo’s repentance by these scenes it has not achieved its goal. For that connotation he should have used surrealistic or abstract cinema language style. Pablo’s personality has been mercilessly felled to a mentally affected and a ridiculous character by these scenes.
Lionel Wendt becomes Pablo’s greatest cultural man and his friend whom he met in the 20th century in colonial Ceylon under the British Government. Neruda greatly appreciates him in his memoirs. But in the film his recorded historical role has been repressed and he has been turned into a comical character.
According to Pablo’s memoirs the Sakkili girl has no attachment to anything. Pablo himself has written that while she was lying with him she did not show any emotion, but lied there silently with her eyes opened and without moving. But in the film, to highlight Pablo’s character as a sexually forceful violent man the unidentified Sakkili woman had been turned into a fighter who opposes Pablo and tries to run away. The scene where Pablo and a woman run around the bed looks comical and is hilarious.
Jossie is fighting with the fishermen, two running policemen and boutique at the seashore the partying of Sakkili men on their pay day as well as the funeral possession of a Scavenger all look as if these scenes have been inserted forcibly into the film. These are unreliable scenes mixing with the film. As an example, as soon as a white officer comes into a place where Scavengers are, coming down the musical stage, removing the headdress and the humble body language are not included in this film. Especially in 1930 incidents like the above are common. But the film has neglected to grasp the 1930s era.
After the incident with Neruda a woman runs towards the sea and washes herself disgustingly. This scene comes at the beginning during the title scenery. From her going into the deep sea the film implies that she will commit suicide.
According to psychological analysis even if a person runs with suicide in mind, after getting a body wash that feeling fades. At the end of the film to show that she was born again contemporarily with the film, a mechanical boat sails behind her. It does look radical but mechanical.
Backdrops and landscapes
Though South Indian musicians sit on the floor for their singing and instrumental presentations, the stage which has been built for the ordinary players in the film is questionable. The urban commercial environment where Alborada was filmed, Pablo’s house and the next door house gives the impression that the backdrop is more suitable for a drama rather than a film.
In the 1930s there could never have been any pine trees along the sea coast in Wellawatte. Pine trees were planted by colonial officers only in upcountry and some other selected places. It’s evident that the landscape study, which should have been done before filming has been neglected.
If this was done, pine trees appearing along Wellawatte beach could have been avoided. In the 1930s there were only typical Sri Lankan trees like coconut, Kadol, Thakkada and Wetakeiya from Bambalapitiya to Wellawatte and Mt. Lavinia along the sea coast.
Subject matter
The Alborada film is based on the world famous book ‘Memoirs’ by Nobel prize winner, poet Pablo Neruda, which is similar to a semi autobiography written in 1929-1931 about his experiences in Ceylon. The dialogue is in English with subtitles. The main characters are the same characters that he had included in his book. That period was the modern era of Sri Lanka or the colonial times under the British Government.
The central figure is Pablo Neruda who was the Chilean ambassador in Sri Lanka. His girl friends, Jossie, Patsy, as well as the unidentified Sakkili woman who comes to clean the toilet and whom Neruda gets attracted to, act as female characters.
Male characters are Neruda, his servant Rathne Aiya and friend Lionel Wendt. For the script of the film the director had taken two characters from the above recorded characters and exaggerated and changed them to fit the script.
These two characters are Neruda and the ordinary woman. Alborada is neither a love story nor a biography. It doesn’t add any value to the modern Sri Lankan history. There is also no definite contextual goal. This film connects several incidents centering an illogical exaggerated incident. These incidents confirm that the goal of this film is to destroy the character of Neruda. All the characters have been built around Neruda to make Neruda the central figure of the film.
Other matters
The spectator forgets to grasp the background music because of the vibration of strong drum beats that mixes with the music. The entire film is composed of close up figures. Long shots are very few. Though the poems in Spanish language are given in English as captions with close up figures, the attention of the spectator towards reading it is weakened because of his attraction to the close up figures.
Artistic photographic angles and the lighting attract the spectator. Two examples come to my mind while writing this review on how a house on the seacoast connects with the sea and how to use a massive landscape in a movie. These examples are from the films 'Nights in Rodanthe' and 'Legends of the fall'.
Alborada is a Spanish word Arunodhaya (Dawn) is its Sinhala meaning. It was also the name of Lionel Wendt’s house in this country. Neruda calls his house Solitary Bungalow. The film’s main incidents happen inside this solitary bungalow. Besides the main name the poem Neruda never wrote is also being used for this film as a secondary name.
It’s a challenge to write again a poem that Neruda never wrote because then it should be extremely artistic, and poetic. From the beginning to the end the production team of the film should have faced this challenge. But that’s not apparent in the film.
Art direction in the film is weak and that has affected the film very much. If the director had gone into a deep discussion about the creation and strongly edited the existing scenes a more challenging work could have been built. More than all other art mediums a film is a creation that achieves its end result on collective labour. But the main vision, goal and the responsibility of manipulating it, falls on the director.
End note
Following are the members of the International Cinema Jury that appeared for the 34th International film festival in 2021 to judge the films including Alborada in the competitive section.
The chairperson of the Jury, Isabelle Huppert has won a number of international awards for her acting in films and dramas. She is a professional actress with full of experiences. She was also the chairperson of the 62nd Cannes Cinema festival.
The other members were, director and script writer Aoyama Shinji, who has won several international awards. His latest film was Living in the sky in 2020. Film critic and comparator, Chris Fujiwara, has composed several books and he is the chief editor of the cinema review magazine, Undercurrent.
His recent study was a theoretical research on world cinema in 1950/1960. Producer and curator, Lorna Tee has contributed to a number of cinema festivals and has a lot of experience in this field. At the moment she is working as an advisor in Macao on film compilation. Sebu Hiroko is a film score composer. She is a lecturer for post graduate courses in cinema in Tokyo film school and the University of Waseda.
The best award in this Tokyo International film festival was won by a Kosovo film maker, Kaltrina Krasniqi, for her film, Vera dreams of the sea. It too was created as a semi-autobiographical drama. Also for the first time the two best awards were taken by female directors.
Asoka Handagama should be appreciated for making two works during the Covid epidemic. These two are Alborada and Antique Kadeka Maranayak. Antique Kadeka Maranayak is a great product that I have seen in recent times. Alborada too should be appreciated though it has weaknesses and visual collapses. A strong criticism is needed to create highly artistic films. Alborada is a film that the spectators in our country should watch.