15 Park Avenue

Has schizophrenia ever been looked into more intimately than this? I don't think so.

The best thing about Aparna Sen's film is that it could have been told from so many points of view. As it is, 15 Park Avenue doesn't stick to one and though we largely see the story unfolding from the elder sister's perspective, it’s not through her eyes. Anjali, the older sister-caregiver character is played by Shabana Azmi and she, like most of the other characters and the film itself, is so many things at the same time. A successful physicist and lecturer, a good daughter and excellent sister, a woman with a failed marriage behind her, an attractive woman who obviously takes care of what she wears and how she looks, and who is attracted to a man even while she has a steady relationship with another, though that seems to be on its last legs. And what’s most attractive about this character is that she’s so human, not a sacrificing saint but someone who is often irritated, angry, frustrated at the situation life has dealt her.

For me, what makes a good film really good is wanting to know more about each of the characters, the back-stories, the stories you sense are there, but being ultimately glad that they are left untold. It's also when you can really see the same situation from several different points of view, and feel each of them are right in their own way, and yet understand why the others involved in the drama can deny that.

Take Joydeep's (Rahul Bose’s) antipathy towards Anjali – he sees her as this dominating, overtly forceful woman who's jealous of any man who might threaten to replace her in her sister's life, while she sees him as a young fool in love who doesn't realise the enormity of the task he is taking on and as the factor that could upset her sister's tenuous hold on sanity, hence is a bit more aggressive towards him than is necessary.

Then there's Mithi, who's beyond points of view. Konkona is... well... she’s also beyond praise, really. I loved the way she portrays the schizophrenic’s certainty that it’s the world, not they, that is skewed. The patience in her voice when she’s explaining things that are obvious to her to the incredulous listeners. “No no I know Palm Avenue, my uncle lives there. I’m looking for Paaark Avenue, not Palm Avenue...”

The way her story unfolds in the film is superb. Not one straight flash-back but a gentle peeling away that reveals the whens and hows and whys. Though it leaves the chronology a bit shaky, one of the weaknesses of the film.

Oh yes, there are plenty. The dialogue, predictably, flags in places. It's mostly in English, and one would rather Anjali and her mother (played by Waheeda Rehman, who is competent in portraying the weak mother who relies wholly on her elder daughter for strength and who is, perhaps, a little afraid of the younger) spoke in Hindi, as they're shown to be a Hindi-speaking family. The bond between this mother-daughter duo is beautifully drawn out, and yet doesn't degenerate into saccharine sweetness. Anjali lashes out at her mother for not being strong enough to take charge of Mithi and her mother tries to placate her with a few soothing lies.

The minor characters are so well drawn-out that they become almost as strong as the protagonists, though I felt Rahul Bose’s wife’s character (played with her usual thoroughness by Shefali Shah) was a bit over-wrought. I thought she was reacting a bit too strongly to her husband’s interest in his ex-girlfriend, though I do know women who are pretty irrational when it comes to their men's past affairs.

A film really works for me when it makes me inhabit its world so completely that I have trouble coming back to my reality after the credits have rolled. After this film was over, I kept sitting in my seat staring at the empty screen, trying not to cry, and so did a young girl sitting next to me, while the people accompanying us stood around patiently waiting for us to snap out of it. Finally, a woman accompanying the girl said “Let’s go. She’s not going to come back.” I realised with a jerk that she’s not, and walked out.