“Sugar in Milk” – Earth

Zarminae Ansari and C.J.S. Wallia have quite different views on Deepa Mehta’s film project, Earth. The former proffers that the director provides a “dispassionate account which shows both Indian and Pakistani sides equally as victims and victimizers”. Further, while Ansari, in her article “Unforgettable”, considers Lenny the lens through which the audience “sees this historic event”, she acknowledges the “child’s confusion about the partition”. Mehta does indeed provide insight into the Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh roles in this period of India’s development through their portrayal as “victims and victimizers” (Ansari). Conversely, Wallia does not appear to appreciate any aspect of the film, as exemplified in his commentary, “the film’s weak storyline, its limiting viewpoint, its poorly developed characters, and the distorted roles of the different Indian religious communities and the British-produce a dismal picture of the complex background-events of the partition”. Additionally, he proffers that Deepa Mehta has “managed to distort the complex history of the partition” in her depiction of the Hindus and Sikhs, which he concludes is ‘false’ and ‘negative’. I found his perspective to be quite intriguing, as each of the groups, save the Parsis who fostered a level of invisibility, were portrayed in various venues that permitted the audience to see the array of emotions and thought processes that accompanied the changes in the political tenor of their country. The filmmaker did an exceptional job of maintaining a neutral atmosphere through the utilization of the Sethna family. The Parsi family remains, virtually, unaffected throughout the film. When Lenny questions their unaffected status, her mother describes them as the sugar in a bowl of milk, “sweet, but invisible”. Mehta’s direction assumes a similar quality, as her perspectives are disguised, thus, permitting the audience to experience these situations without the dictates of a political agenda – “unforgettable”.