Incendies and Haider – Connected across languages.
Incendies (2010) by Denis Villeneuve and Haider (2014) by Vishal Bhardwaj are both modern masterpieces. ‘Incendies’, based on a play of the same name which has the flavour of a Greek tragedy, and ‘Haider’ based on the Shakespearean tragedy ‘Hamlet’ are connected in quite a similar number of ways. This makes me wonder how Cinema, as an art form is beginning to grow within me gradually. Before starting the article, let me thank Denis Villeneuve and Vishal Bhardwaj for giving us these gems!
· A SIMILAR BACKDROP
While Incendies is set in an unnamed Middle Eastern country in the middle of a Civil War (Based on the source material, we can see that it is Lebanon), Haider is set in the backdrop of the Kashmir insurgency during 1995.
The similar backdrops serve a major purpose in the respective stories. At times, the protagonists’ stories seem just an example of many similar stories amidst the sufferings of the population that is being affected by such wars and insurgencies.
· SEARCHING FOR A MISSING FAMILY MEMBER
In Incendies, Jeanne Marwan (Mélissa Désormeaux-Poulin) begins the search for her newly known half-brother and her father who was assumed to be dead. In Haider, once returning from Aligarh, Haider (Shahid Kapoor) begins the search for his missing father.
And in both these movies, that search forms the crux of the story and the traces of that journey helped them to find who they are and especially the nature of their families.
· SINGING IN PRISONER CAMPS
Honestly, the first parallel that struck me was this singing parallel. Once I saw Hilaal Meer (Narendra Jha) singing amidst the tortures and sufferings in prisoner camps, I immediately got reminded of ‘The Woman Who Sings’ from Incendies.
Music is universal. and its emotions too. It can be joyous, melancholic, spiritual, painful, and can also be a resistance. We can see how both Hilaal Meer and Nawal Marwan (Lubna Azabal) chose to sing their sorrows out among all the terrible things that happened around them.
· OEDIPUS COMPLEX
In Incendies, it is a real tragedy element. Here, we can draw comparisons to ‘Oedipus Rex’, an Athenian tragedy by Sophocles. Abou Tareq (Abdelghafour Elaaziz) was unaware of his identity as Nihad, which eventually led to the tragedy of him becoming the father of his brother and sister.
Seriously, most people who love Haider don’t want to speak about this element from the Shakespearean source material on which the movie was based. Though the sexual tension between Haider and Ghazala (Tabu) was not explicitly shown, there were clear hints from Vishal Bhardwaj. The most important reason why Haider hates Khurram (Kay Kay Menon) for marrying his mother may be learned from the condition called the ‘Oedipus complex’. As said in a Netflix video essay on Haider, Haider hates Khurram because he is doing what Haider was not able to do – ‘Killing Hilaal Meer and marrying Ghazala’.
· THE ART OF FORGIVENESS
In Incendies, Abou Tareq receives two letters at the climax. One from the women he tortured in prison and one from his mother. First, we get the letter from the tortured woman. The letter is full of despise. And the second letter is full of love and care. Even though he did horrible things, he is after all her son. The one she promised to love no matter what happens. And even after the worst of all happened, she chose to forgive his son. That’s the promise she made when he was born and she stood by that.
In Haider’s climax, Ghazala reiterates the words of her father-in-law to Haider. She asks Haider to let go of the revenge feeling, for that revenge only begets further revenge. Haider declines that initially. But when Ghazala kills herself using a suicide vest and Khurram is gravely injured from that blast, Haider gets a chance to finally get his revenge. But he chose not to. He chose to forgive Khurram. He chose the side of life just like his father.
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