The book was called un-filmable not only because of the technical challenges but because the way the story plays out; there are large portions where nothing significant happens and how do you keep expressing what a boy is feeling. However, master filmmaker, Ang Lee brought it alive on the big screen and in a way one couldn’t imagine. Life of Pi is not only visually stunning but is a deeply moving film that despite all the technical wizardry is far from the usual holiday blockbusters.
For those not aware of the story, Life of Pi is about a 13-year old Indian boy, Piscine Molitor Patel aka Pi, from Pondicherry (now Puducherry) who is born a Hindu but is also Muslim and Christian. He believes in God and sees a kind soul in everyone… even wild animals. He loses his family in a ship-wreck and finds himself in a lifeboat with some cargo from his father’s zoo – a zebra, an orangutan, a hyena and a tiger (Richard Parker). The rest of the story is about his amazing journey, survival and faith in God.
Life of Pi is full of questions that the movie does not seek to answer. While we might want a filmmaker to plant a flag, point to a path, Ang Lee gets the viewer to do the soul searching. Ravishingly gorgeous visuals are embedded in an electrifying saga that tests human endurance and is anchored in bonding with other forms of life. This bonding that occurs at the level of the soul (Pi believes animals have souls you can connect with), and if one does not believe in soul, than the bonding that occurs through the senses. When Richard Parker walks off unceremoniously into the jungle, towards the end, Pi laments, “All of life is an act of letting go, but what hurts is not taking a moment to say goodbye.”
This is a story about life, in every one of its forms, real and imaginary, and life can hardly ever exist, without the presence of other life. In Pi’s journey, the ocean sparkles. This is a story of transformation where a child becomes a man, first dealing with fear, then thirst, then hunger, threats from a hyena, then a fierce will to survive, loosing his rations in yet another deadly storm, unpredictability of the ocean, his face-off with the tiger and then his acceptance of the companion on board. In the end, he sums it up, “my fear of him kept me alert and tending to his needs gave me purpose”.
Indeed, why must we believe that reality is limited, when we have not experienced all of reality and from all the perspectives?
Perhaps the senses are heightened or the reality is different at a certain altitude or in the middle of the night the ocean sparkles with phosphorescence, in an unimaginable way. After all, our experience with life is at such an infinitely small scale anyway.
Michael Danna’s background score is beautiful and reminds you a bit about his earlier Indian outings like Monsoon Wedding and Water. Among the actors, Suraj Sharma as Pi has done a fine job for a debutant and shows great promise as an actor. Tabu as Pi’s mother is as graceful as ever but I wish she had a few more scenes. Like her, other actors including Gérard Depardieu, Adil Hussain, Rafe Spall and Irrfan Khan have small roles but all just right. The real star of the film however is Richard Parker, the computer generated tiger. He is so real, so majestic and so beautiful; like Pi, you develop a bond with him and feel disappointed with his indifference. I absolutely loved the movie and encourage everyone to see it at least once!
