Like Köken Ergun’s project, A Passage to India is an example of art exploring contemporary repercussions of colonialism. Dealing with the same issues, the two films also feature a similar scene: in A Passage to India we see Indian musicians in British ceremonial dress playing music before a white audience at a garden party, while in Young Turks African students do a traditional dance, cheered by Turkish viewers welcoming the exotic performance.
The film is based on a novel of the same title by E. M. Forster set in the 1920s. The clash of cultures is pictured in the context of a young and stubborn British lady’s journey to India. In the film, set in the same era, a young Indian doctor accompanies a group of female English tourists on their trip to the caves. When one of them accuses him of attempted rape, he struggles to prove his innocence, as he finds himself confronting the British colonial system, where the word of an Indian seems to be worthless against the word of a white person.
Directed by: David Lean
Running time: 163 minutes
United Kingdom, 1984