REVIEW: Jhing Chik Jhing

CHILDREN OF HEAVEN

Hindi cinema is going through a particularly listless period in its history. Not quite as bad as the ‘80s, but not much better either. There’s a serious dearth of good scripts and the idea of earning revenue through international ticket sales and NRI audiences has driven our films away from the realities of life in India, both urban and rural.

The Marathi film industry, on the other hand, seems to have revived itself by looking inwards. In the last three years, there’s been a slew of interesting films set in rural Maharashtra, some witty, others poignant; all well-produced, intelligently made and equally alluring –- Valu, Gabhricha Paus, Tingya, Natarang, Jogwa and now, Nitin Nandan’s Jhing Chik Jhing.

The film’s title suggests a happy children’s story. Which it is, at least in part. But it is also a lament for the plight of poor cotton farmers in central Maharashtra whose families are crushed under debt and the weight of a system that devalues their contribution to the production process. As Mauli (Bharat Jadhav) ironically notes halfway through the film, what kind of a world do we live in where a cotton farmer’s son can’t afford a new pair of shorts? But although Shyam (Chinmay Kambli) cribs to his father about the holes in his school uniform (which earn him the ridicule of friends and the ire of the teacher), he’s basically a cheerful boy, intelligent and curious about life.

He finds a mentor in Kavi (Dilip Prabhawalkar) who the villagers dub a madman for his radical farming methods and denouncement of artificial fertilizers and pesticides. Kavi introduces Shyam to the joys of nature and allots him a small patch of land on his field to grow plants of his choice. Meanwhile Mauli is sinking deeper and deeper into a debt he may not be able to repay. He has already mortgaged his bulls and borrowed a great deal of money from various people including a vicious moneylender. When the cotton crop of the season doesn’t fetch him the revenue he’d hoped to earn for it, his world starts spinning out of his control. The house and land have to be mortgaged to the same moneylender and it’s a matter of time before the family will end up on the road.

In the tradition of Iranian art house cinema, Nandan weaves his heavy theme around the innocence and freedom of childhood. While Shyam and his sister Deepti (Arti More) are aware of their parents’ problems, they still have the ability to laugh and even be optimistic about overcoming this insurmountable situation. They device different schemes to bail out their father, who, for lack of other options has decided to commit suicide with the whole family.

The film gets a little preachy in the parts where Kavi extols the virtues of organic farming. But barring these bits, it’s narrative alternates smoothly between the child’s carefree world and the father’s despondency. The acting is fantastic –- while the mother (Madhavi Juvekar) and sister have relatively smaller roles, they’re perfectly cast. Bharat Jadhav is a revelation as Mauli. His face bears the tortured look of a decent and sensitive man’s crushing defeat in the face of life’s struggles. And Chinmay Kambli is a natural actor. He doesn’t ham or act cute -– he just slips into Shyam’s tattered shorts and happy demeanour with effortless ease and it is his charisma that tugs at your heartstrings and provides this gem of a film with its emotional core.