.::Kiranjit Ahluwalia-True Story::.

Hey…here’s me again!! I’ve got a fantastic true story to tell you people. This time it’s about Kiranjit Ahluwalia! She’s the lady who had experienced marital abuse and finally burned her husband in fire and was convicted for manslaughter, for her husband’s death. But was then released after organizations stepped up in protecting her!

Aishwarya Rai and Kiranjit Ahluwalia

Here’s the story from wikipedia.
In 1979, at the age of 24, Ahluwalia left her home of Chakkalal in Punjab to travel to the United Kingdom after wedding her British Indian husband--a man she had only met once. For ten years, she suffered domestic violence of profound severity. Her husband's abuse took the form of physical violence, food deprivation, and rape.

When Ahluwalia looked to her family for help, they reprimanded her, saying it was a matter of family honor that she remain with her husband. She ultimately tried running away from home, but was found by her husband and brought back into her abusive environment. During her marriage, Ahluwalia had two sons, Ravi and Sanjay, who often bore witness to the violence she endured.

One evening in the spring of 1989, Ahluwalia was attacked by her husband as he tried to break her ankles and burn her face with a hot iron, apparently trying to extort money from her extended family. Later that night while her husband lay sleeping, she draped a blanket soaked with gasoline around his feet, ignited it with a candle, and ran into a garden with her three-year-old son.

In a later interview she discussed her thoughts that night, "I decided to show him how much it hurt. At times I had tried to run away, but he would catch me and beat me even harder. I decided to burn his feet so he couldn't run after me."

Five days later, Deepak died from complications of his burn injuries. Ahluwalia, who could only speak broken English at the time, was arrested and ultimately charged with murder and sentenced to life imprisonment at Lewes Crown Court on December 7 1989. At the time, her council made little of the violence she had endured, while the prosecution suggested that Ahluwalia was motivated by jealousy due to her husband's repeated affairs.

Her case eventually came to the attention of the Southall Black Sisters (SBS) and Ahluwalia became a symbol of the repression of Asian women as the group pressed for a mistrial. Ahluwalia had her life sentence remanded in 1992 on grounds of insufficient council--Ahluwalia had not been aware that she could plead guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility. In addition, it was brought to light that she was suffering from severe depression when she lashed back at her husband, which had likely altered her decision making abilities at the time.

Ultimately, Ahluwalia's struggle helped raise awareness of domestic violence in families of non-English speaking immigrants to Western countries, as well as changing the laws for domestic abuse victims in the United Kingdom. Her case, known in British legal textbooks as R vs. Ahluwalia, changed the definition of the word 'provocation' in cases of battered women, so as to reclassify her crime as manslaughter instead of murder.

Cool huh!! See what one lady can do!! Amazing isn’t it??!!!

Ok la..What prompt me into publishing this is, I bought Provoked cast by Aishwarya Rai and found out it was a true story. So I looked it up!! But see…now you know about Kiran Ahluwalia right!!

And check out the awards she received:-

Ahluwalia was honored in 2001 at the first Asian Women Awards for helping to bring to light a subject that had been kept behind closed doors in the patriarchal Sikh culture. She has also since written an autobiography with co-author Rahila Gupta, Circle of Light.
Her story was fictionalized in the controversial film Provoked, which was recently screened at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. Naveen Andrews

That’s that for now.

-End-

.::Grigori Kozintsev King Lear::.

I went to KLPac on 10th June and watched Grigori Kozintsev King Lear in Russian. And I’ve came across certain things and I will like to mention those.

Firstly, the film was all black and white. Some of the audience found it really dull. However, Kozintsev did that for a reason. The black and white setting of the play gives more effect and impact towards the audience. Since it’s all black and white, it symbolizes death, mourning and gives a very dark imagery. It doesn’t give a pleasant sight. Kozintsev wants the audience to feel this ruthless place, the dark and dull setting, and the dark imageries, and thus making the audience involved in the play.

The act opens, showing peasants, poor people, and all wearing black attire. All were heading towards King Lear’s castle. Yet, these peasants, weren’t just peasants, but they are peasants with broken leg, with only an eye, scars and marks on their bodies, thin physic, and all sickly looking. This shows that Lear is not one of an ‘ideal king’ that the audience though he would be. He has failed to keep the country right in shape. Lear doesn’t even bother to greet his people when they are all dried up by the sun, sitting and kneeling in front of the castle.

The time where he was dividing his kingdom, Cordelia stood aside wearing white. While others in the play were all dressed in black. Including King Lear himself dressed in black. This illustrates not only symbolizing death but also symbolizes Lear mourning over his own irrational and rash decision in the later scene. It foreshadows Lear’s future. Cordelia’s white garment portrays her innocence and purity. It also symbolizes her death in a way because of her country’s failure in winning the war. (Between France and England).

And I’ve also noticed that, Lear sits down near a burning fire. And he seeks warmth. And he desires that warmth obviously. But it’s such a contrast to Act 4; Scene 5 where he says “..there is the sulphurous pit, burning, scalding, stench, consumption. Fie, fie fie; pah pah!” The repetition of the diction “fie” and “pah” shows how he could feel the burn of Goneril and Regan, the two daughters who betrayed him. The alliteration “f” and “p” makes the character enunciate the word which gives a stronger impact to what he is saying. And thus this shows the pain and hurt Lear has gone through. Shakespeare connects Goneril and Regan as fiends and Lear who seeks warmth at first (referring both to Act 1 and Act 2 when he visits Goneril and Regan for accommodation) now rejecting it. In Act 3; Scene 2, he prefers to be in the storm.

In the storm scene, Lear fights the storm with poor Fool hiding behind him. And the storm pushes Lear backwards. I find this amazing. The storm symbolizes Lear’s state of mind. And since it’s seen like that, I find that the storm (Lear’s mind) is pushing Lear backwards yet Lear still tries to stand firmly and go against it. This symbolizes Lear (storm) wanting to go back and undo his mistakes but yet his ego (Lear’s characteristic) makes him go against that. He could go back to Cordelia, but he doesn’t want to because of his ego.
Some other things I noticed in the film was that the Fool is a boy rather in the BBC Production King Lear, the Fool is man, somewhat to Lear’s age. And in my perspective, why Kozintsev made a boy play Fool, is because the Fool is seen as a jester to the king and a small boy is always seen naïve. But here in this play, the Fool conveys important message behind his jest. In Act 1; Scene 5, “Nor I neither; but I can tell why a snail has a house./ Why, to put’s head in, not to give it away to his daughters, and leave his horns without a case”. It reveals that even though the Fool is a boy and thought to be naïve for his age, yet he knows Lear’s big mistake. This is to illustrate the line of how rash Lear’s decision is and how blind he is that he couldn’t see the mistake that he made before. Hence this evokes the theme of Blindness or Appearance vs. Reality.
In another scene, when Lear was leaving his castle and was going to Goneril’s palace, there was an animal imagery inserted by Kozintsev. There were many white birds flying in the sky. And this symbolizes the many knights (100 knights) that Lear still has. Or it can also symbolize the departure of the oily art. As in, the fake appearance of Cornwall, Regan and Goneril had vanished and their true values are revealed. And in the end of the play, there will be only one white bird flying which symbolizes Cordelia or if we take the first interpretation of the white birds “100 knights” then it symbolizes Kent disguised as Caius.

Other than that, the Fool plays the music in the end of the play. I guess that, that audio imagery can symbolize the beginning of something. Even in Act 1, the music was played, and the betrayal begins and at the end the music was played again to exemplify the beginning of another event because Edgar will be up for the throne.

So yeah, these are the few things I notice in the film. There are other things too but it’s just that the others very obvious. See…I can analyze! Yay!