Looking at you

How do you say, 8220;Here8217;s looking at you, kid,8221; in Malayalam? Director Rajeev Nath has announced his next venture, Ezham Mudra, a remake of Casablanca in Malayalam. Rick8217;s bar in wartime Casablanca will be recreated as a restaurant in contemporary southern India, and Ingrid Bergman8217;s equivalent will be Mandira Bedi. She will, said the director, play a Sri Lankan Tamil separatist rebel seeking assistance to escape from India. The 1942 original, set in Vichy-controlled Morocco, is such a classic, with every detail and gesture so dear to the film8217;s generations of fans that most plans worldwide for remakes and sequels have over the years been abandoned. Nath8217;s plan is thus courageous. And it makes us think.

Recall, in the original Bergman plays the wife of a Czech Resistance leader looking for a way out Casablanca. They run into her former lover Rick in his atmospheric nightclub. The release of the film, incidentally, overlapped with the Allied invasion of North Africa and the subsequent Churchill-Roosevelt summit in Casablanca. And given its attendant moral of duty above personal affection, it is little wonder that it was received by many as a propaganda film. As time went by, however, Casablanca became for viewers one of the most seductively tragic love stories of all time. Nath has evidently learnt some lessons from all this. His film, he is reported to have said, will not be political, and that he would like to premiere it in Casablanca.

Here then is our suggestion to him. Casablanca8217;s most enduring physical legacy is the multitude of Rick8217;s bars that dot the globe. Even in the city itself, with freshly painted white buildings justifying its name, the only throwback to the shadowy transactions of wartime can be found in a reconstructed bar the film was shot in a studio. So, we say to the courageous Mr Nath, play your politics as makes you most comfortable, but do pay heed to the restaurant you create. Were your film to be a success, we will be dining in the restaurant8217;s clones for many years to come.