Immigration is today a subject of political contention in many countries, especially the United States. The issue is being debated hotly and also abstractly. There are problems like costs and benefits involved when millions arrive, the shifting demographic contours, and also the more important issues like identity and security.
For centuries the US has confronted the immigration problem. It has been the theme of many films but mostly picturing immigrants flourishing in the land of dreams, an ideal world, where the immigrants coexist harmoniously with a dash of sentimentality and nostalgia thrown in.
Top-notch Italian director Emanuele Crialese uses immigration in his films as a stark, powerful metaphor. It is in a way autobiographical; a reminder of Emanuele’s experiences, intense strangeness, when he moved from Rome to New York in the early 1990s.
“Immigration is not a label in my films. It is not the sociological or political aspect that bothers me but the human side. What happens to a man when he reaches a strange land, his dreams, and his state of mind is what I’m concerned about, I’m concerned about that existential feeling of not belonging. I’m interested in showing the metamorphosis of man, shedding his origin, his roots, his language, his traditions to become something new. My films don’t pass judgments rather I attempt to portray a slice of our society,” avers Emanuele, who was at the Nagarjuna Ayurvedic Centre at Kalady, a place he vouches for every time he felt ‘a chaos in his mind.’
Emanuele travelled to New York intending to complete a short course in film making at the Tisch School of the Arts. He made a short film that won him a scholarship, which allowed him to continue for some more years. He stayed in tenements occupied for generations by immigrants making him always conscious of their lives, their minds. Emanuele graduated and now had to go home, which he did not want. “I and some of my college friends were hanging on without proper visas. That’s when we thought of making a film. I was working as a waiter in a restaurant and managed to raise some money from my customers and with the owner and my friends also pitching in. Soon we were into production. We shot the film in New York with a 35mm camera hidden in a bag that I lugged along always scared that the police would accost us. We did rehearsals, canned the scene, and ran away in different directions to meet at an appointed place 300 metres away. That’s how we made Once We Were Strangers (1997).”
This directorial debut feature film participated in the Sundance Film Festival, making him the first Italian director to be accepted in an American competition. “It was interesting to hear President Barack Obama say in a televised address to his nation the other day that Americans will always be a nation of immigrants. And then he said ‘we were strangers once, too,’ a coincidental reference to my film that looked at this theme through characters like that of a Sicilian illegal immigrant and an Indian who dubs porn films.”
Emanuele returned home with plans for his next film. He began working on his story and after four years of work his second film Respiro ( Breath ) was released. In 2003 this Italian film was released in English-language markets and won accolades and critical acclaim. Emanuele won the Critics Week Grand Prize and the Young Critics Award at the Cannes Film Festival. The film was nominated for the Best European Union Film at the César Awards. “This was my most financially successful film. And one that really set me on a film making career. It opened the doors for finance for my other films.”
Set in an Italian seaside fishing village the film was very different from his first film. “It was the turning point. It made me decide to stay on in Italy and make films. My parents were not happy when I decided on this career. They wanted me to become a lawyer, a sort of family tradition. This film justified my decision.”
Emaneule’s Nuovo Mondo ( Golden Door ) was presented by none other than Martin Scorsese. This film went back to Emanuele’s favourite theme of immigration, crossing the Atlantic and arriving at Ellis Island. But Emaneule made it a different experience with his amazing wide-screen compositions. The film won the Silver Lion at the Venice International Film Festival and a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars.
“I am a bit slow for the film industry. I take my time, not wanting to rush. I want to make sure everything is right because so much money is involved. I often have to live for two or three years with a story idea, with the vision of the film, before I actually get working on it. I have my own rhythm, which sometimes does not suit the general pattern,” Emaneule says about his working style. He then adds that his last film Terraferma ( Mainland ) was the fastest he worked on.
The film premiered at the 68th Venice International Film Festival where it was screened in the competition section and won the Special Jury Prize. Terraferma blended myth and reality that talked about ordinary people, about all those searching for a terraferma.
“One needs to love life, needs to travel, meet people if you have to tell stories about life and people. Moreover, for me film making is a very arduous task. There are moments when I’m exhausted. It was during one such moment that a friend told me about this Ayurveda centre in Kerala. I knew nothing about it or about India. I came here and found so much grace, humanness. From being a self-centred egoist I began to understand my mind and body. The three-weeks I was here was a sort of purgation.”
Emanuele has a couple of story ideas in mind, which he intends to work on once he is back in Rome. “This is my third visit to Kerala, only to this centre and an ashram in Thiruvanthapuram. Next time I’ll be here for a longer time and perhaps will even make a documentary on Ayurveda,” says Emanuele.
