Sunday, April 27th ~ 12:00 pm

The Mystic Masseur

India/2001/117 min/35mm

Director: Ismail Merchant
Producers: Richard Hawley, Nayeem Hafizka
Screenplay: Caryl Phillips
Editor: Roberto Silvi
Production Design: Lucy Richardson
Cinematographer: Ernest Vincze
Composers: Zakir Hussain, Richard Robbins
Cast: Aasif Mandvi, Om Puri, Ayesha Dharker, James Fox, Jimi Mistry, Sakina Jaffrey, Zohra Segal

This gem from director Ismail Merchant is based on the comic novel by Nobel Prize winner V.S. Naipaul. The hero, Ganesh Ransumair, is a schoolteacher in Trinidad's capital city. When he travels back to his country village for his father's burial he decides to make a go of it as a writer. His first novel fails and in an effort to make money, Ganesh takes up his father's trade, that of village healer. When he 'cures' a young boy, word spreads of his remarkable skills and his fortunes take a positive turn.

English

Introduction by Ismail Merchant