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Lagaan Illuminates Cricket ( the game not the grasshopper)

I recommend Lagaan. It is a Bollywood movie with a difference. I sat down to watch it after the trauma of voting in the European elections.  At the start I did not know whether I would last the course as it is a rather wordy, archaic film, but its charm grew and by the end  […]

I recommend Lagaan. It is a Bollywood movie with a difference. I sat down to watch it after the trauma of voting in the European elections.  At the start I did not know whether I would last the course as it is a rather wordy, archaic film, but its charm grew and by the end  Significant and I were entranced . It tells the story of a cricket match between an Indian village team and their local British overlords. There is a stake on the game: the tax, Lagaan. If they lose they have to pay double tax, and if they win they do not have to pay any tax for three years. The village of course wins, but in order to do so they have to put together a team which includes a Sikh, a Saddhu, a Moslem, a disabled Untouchable and bunch of woodcutters and farmers. The film makers managed to find eleven of the most unprepossessing English actors to act the  Villainous English team which they did with gusto. The acting was uniformly bold and bad and delightful, like two hours of top class charade. But it was a moving moral tale. The villagers had to overcome their differences and their caste prejudices in order to fight for their very survival. As with all Bollywood films song and dance acts were interspersed with the action, but the songs were beautiful devotional hymns to Lord Krishna, sung in that extraordinary high pitched treble that only Indian film stars seem to be able to achieve.  The cricket match itself formed a large part of the film and was bliss. At the end of it Significant declared that she had finally understood what cricket was all about. High praise.

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