It is not quite
often that a short story is picked by a film director. It is hard to add flab
and make a ten page story to a full length movie, just the way it is hard to compress
a sprawling novel to make it fit in a two or three hour movie. It may be worth
comparing the results of such attempts and see whether the likes of Le Miserables, Midnight’s Children and Life
of Pi work better or Brokeback
Mountain, The Japanese Wife and My Son the Fanatic do, as movie
adaptations.
Hanif Kureishi’s
short story ‘My Son the Fanatic’ is ideal material for a movie adaptation and
the director Udayan Prasad must have known it at the first reading itself. He
explored the flexible portions of the action packed story imaginatively, and the outcome
is a brilliant, engaging movie that interprets the story in a very interesting
manner. But a reader who approaches the story freshly may have a different
interpretation which is equally, if not more, relevant. I had that privilege,
but I enjoyed the movie version as well, when I saw it a couple of years later.
The story starts
with a quick paced description of how Parvez, the father of Ali, notices that
his son has become remarkably tidier, and weary of worldly possessions. The third
person narrative flows unobtrusively to show how Ali, the young Pakistani man
in England has stopped seeing his English girlfriend. His regular friends have
stopped ringing too. Parvez is a taxi driver, and though he finds it difficult
at first to share his worries about his son to his colleagues, he breaks his
silence once. His friends assume that Ali is into drugs and is selling his
possessions to pay for the drugs. Ali opens up to Bettina too, who works as a
prostitute. She gives him some tips, on how to examine Ali’s habits and
physical symptoms to see whether he is really a drug addict.
The relationship
between Parvez and Bettina is presented in a unique way. They are really close
– Parvez has known her for three years and they share almost all that happens
in their lives. There is no hint that they are physically close, as the movie
version suggests. But it is possible to interpret it in whatever way a reader
likes, when the narrator says, “[O]nce he had rescued her from a violent
client, and since then they had come to care for one another” (Kuresihi, Collected Stories 118). Parvez finds
out that his son is not at all a drug addict, and that he was not selling his
belongings but just throwing them out. And one day he realises that his son has
started praying five times a day. Parvez had avoided all religions ever since
he had some bad experiences related to religious education and expectations in
his childhood in Lahore.
Parvez takes a
reluctant Ali to a restaurant where he hopes to give the boy a piece of his
mind. But Ali assumes power quickly to tell his father that he is breaking the
rules of Koran when Parvez takes an alcoholic drink. And he accuses Parvez of
eating pork pies and forcing his wife to cook pork sausages at home. He says
that Parvez is “too implicated in Western civilization” (122). He starts
praising some radical attitudes related to his religion and reveals his idea
that “[T]he West was a sink of hypocrites, adulterers, homosexuals, drug takers
and prostitutes” (122). He also talks about the persecution of Muslims and the
imminent jihad if the situation
doesn’t change. On their drive back home, Parvez tries to persuade the boy to
believe that it makes sense to enjoy the English life. Ali does not come down
from his moral high ground to take any advice by Parvez.
Bettina
dissuades Parvez from throwing his son out of his home, as he confesses that he
was planning to do it. Taking her advice, he even tries to pass on his philosophy
of life to Ali, but in vain. One evening, while Bettina was sitting in Parvez’s
car after visiting a client, they spot Ali on the street. Paying heed to
Bettina’s request, he lets Ali in the car. But Ali uses harsh words against
Bettina’s 'profession' and insults her. She gets out of the car even as it is
moving. Parvez gets really angry after this incident, and he beats up Ali at
home, while he was praying. The boy doesn’t cover himself or retaliate, but
says “through his split lip: ‘So who’s the fanatic now?’ ” (127).
It can be said
that Kureishi is not too harsh on any of his characters. He allows them the
freedom to stick to their convictions. Parvez is not a Western man, but he
tries to fit in there, despite the fact that he is a Pakistani immigrant. The
movie version shows the father speaking English with a Pakistani accent, and
the son speaking English like a native. Paradoxically, it is the father who is
more at home with the Western culture while the son is brainwashed to such an
extent that he hates the very concept of Western culture. The intolerance shown
towards the West and his blinkered view of the world qualifies him to be a
fanatic. Kureishi uses to good effect the response from Ali when he gets beaten
up by Parvez. The ending of the story is ambiguous, and prior to watching the movie version, I was tempted to cook up my own extensions of the story.
There is a hint that the blind advocacy of all things Western may also lead to
some sort of fanaticism.
As all good
stories could, ‘My Son the Fanatic’ hints at a few sociocultural issues as well. It predicts the growth and spread of
fanaticism in places like England. Kureishi had done a lot of research among
the young Pakistani men/boys in England in order to present things that are factually correct. His playful and clever approach to the theme of the story
and the powerful language he uses makes it a treat, to be savoured in leisure.
One may even close her/his eyes for a while after reading it and start playing
an individual movie version of the story, putting all the good bits together in
the inner mind. That is what I did, and my movie version was very different
from that of Udayan Prasad, but as I said earlier, I liked the latter version
as well. I may even like ten other versions by discerning movie directors, or
even more.
Bibliography
Kureishi, Hanif.
Collected Stories. Print. London: Faber
and Faber, 2010.
Thanks dear
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