Gurvinder Singh's Alms for a Blind Horse

Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan / Alms for a Blind Horse (2011, India, Gurvinder Singh)

Gurvinder Singh’s brilliant debut film depicts the hardships that Indian farmers/workers face in their daily lives as they battle greedy landowners while living alongside pollution generating coal stacks. The film’s realistic portrayal of life in Punjab is rarely seen in cinema, as is the film's style. The film came out in 2011 but its style is not like other contemporary Indian movies. Instead, the film’s mise-en-scène is more akin to that of the Parallel Indian Cinema of the 1970s and 80s especially that of the great Mani Kaul. That is not a coincidence because the late Mani Kaul served as a creative producer on Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan.

Nods to Mani Kaul’s cinema are apparent early on from the daily morning rituals of the farmers to even how interactions are portrayed in the film. The camera only shows what needs to be shown and no dialogues are wasted.

In one quiet beautiful sequence, the local farmers visit the village leader to complain about their land troubles. A few words are exchanged. The village leader gets up, quietly walks over and brings his gun with him. That gun, which doesn’t need to be used, is a reminder to the villagers who is the boss.

 

Gurvinder Singh has smartly stitched in plenty of references to social, economic, health and political problems plaguing locals within the film’s framework. For example, problems about alcohol addiction (prevalent in Punjab) are part of a discussion among some locals while union protests are in the backdrop as characters are trying to cross the street.

 

 

In other films set in Punjab, one only sees lush green fields. Yet, that is not the case here. Singh and Satya Nagpaul’s camera capture elements that are absent from other Indian cinema. For example, I can’t recall seeing coal stacks in any other recent Indian film. Yet, the omnipresent coal stacks which are quietly polluting the skies and leading to health problems are a major source of power in India. Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan corrects that omission and one can see coal stacks in many scenes.

Mani Kaul sadly passed away on July 6, 2011, a few months before Anhey Ghorhey Da Daan debuted at the Venice Film Festival. In that sense, Gurvinder Singh’s cinematic gift carries the torch passed on from Mani Kaul.

On another note, Singh’s follow-up film Chauthi Koot debuted at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard in 2015 and is a riveting piece of cinema.