There is no way any formal words can describe what director Lakshmipriya Devi has achieved in her fragile yet ferociously strong narrative about a little boy in Manipur searching for his missing father.
Hell, that description above is like saying Schindler’s List is about a kind man who saves lives. Funny, I thought of Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List at one particular point in Boong when the single mother Mandakini (Bala Hijam, incandescent) walks into an all-white memorial for the dead in a shimmering pink saree. It reminded of the girl in the red coat in Spielberg’s film.
There is a sublime innocence in the storytelling of Boong. Even the ‘evil’ Pradhan (Thoudam Brajabidhu), who screens forbidden Hindi films in a backroom (banned Hindi films are mentioned more than once, and Kuch Kuch Hota Hai gets a special mention), is a harmless bloke.
You don’t get to hate a single character in Boong. This is not about villains and heroes. It is about seeking a smile in a situation of deep sorrow. When little Boong (an absolutely incredible Gugun Kipgen) sets off on a secret mission with his ‘outsider’ bestie Raju (Angom Sanamatum) to find his father, we know this cannot end well.
And it doesn’t. But the sorrow of a dead end, the numbness of defeat, is mutated into a mellow, melodious meditation on life’s vagaries. We may find them cruel. But they are what they are.
Acceptance, which is not always the same as resignation, plays a very big hand in writer-director Lakshmipriya Devi’s tender trot into heartbreak land. Here is a film that doesn’t shy away from sentimentality or cultural pride. But the messaging, if we may call it that, is so muted it never feels intrusive.
Boong derives its forceful mood from its tender, slender, but supple and strong sense of selfhood. The Manipuri landscape, shot with such subdued grace by Tanay Satam, feels like a real but unpunctuated presence, defining rather than straitjacketing the characters. The narrative travels from Imphal to Ukhrul to Moreh to Myanmar. But it doesn’t feel like a travelogue.
It is the other journey, the one within the characters, that irrigates every corner of this stirring drama of heartbreak and redemption. Like all great works of art, this one can be viewed in many ways. It is a mother-son story told with an evocative emotional vigour. It is the story of two young boys who, willy-nilly, iron out the cultural differences between them. It is also about a misplaced Rajasthani man (Vikram Kochhar) and his absolutely selfless emotions for a local Manipuri woman.
Oh yes, it is also about a kind cross-dresser (Jenny Khurai) and Madonna’s song ‘Like A Virgin’. How does all of this fit in so effortlessly???!!!
Most of all, Boong finds for us what the movies are rapidly relinquishing. Feelings.
