A Tale of a Naughty Girl (Manda Meyer Upakhyan) Director: Buddhadeb Dasgupta Country: India Year: 2002

CAST:
Samata Das, Rituparna Sengupta, Arpan Basar, Ramgopal Bajaj, Tapash Paul

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"Mind, body – all men care about is their dangling few inches."
–a young prostitute in A Tale of a Naughty Girl

Buddhadeb Dasgupta has long been considered one of the major forces in Indian cinema (hardly news to those who saw The Wrestlers at the 2000 Festival). Poetic and haunting, A Tale of a Naughty Girl doesn't just reaffirm this reputation; it underscores it in the most vivid way possible. Dasgupta's latest finds poetry and hope in the darkest and least hopeful places. Set at the time of the first moon landing, this poignant film recounts a young girl's overwhelming need to escape her provincial life and the tawdry destiny that awaits her – contrasting NASA's technocratic victory with the travails of Lati, a small-town prostitute's daughter.

The film opens with the ostensible villain, wealthy businessman and cinema owner Badu, as he watches rape scenes from contemporary films, clipped together on a specially produced reel. The more tactile object of his lust is the virginal Lati, whose mother is determined to escape her dreary, doomed existence by marrying off her daughter. Instead, the educated Lati dreams of leaving Gospaira – a town so disreputable cabbies won't even go there. Dasgupta juxtaposes Lati's tale with the history of the women who wind up in the sex trade: one is tossed out by her husband; another supports hers. These women know they're in a version of hell, but steel themselves with cynical humour, which makes Lati's resolve to escape her fate all the more touching.

Exquisitely photographed and designed, A Tale of a Naughty Girl contrasts ethereal elements (Lati is consistently framed against the moon, a symbol of escape) with an all-too-worldly reality. Close-ups of a rotting tree underline Badu's motives, but in the same forest, Lati sees the teacher who has opened her eyes to the world – a reminder of what is possible.

In some ways – despite its period setting – the film seems utterly contemporary, implicitly contrasting Badu's misogynist obsessions with our own violent and image-obsessed culture. It may well be worthy of that overused term: masterpiece.

– Steve Gravestock