SpuffyWeb Sadly Over-hyped

ThrillMessage There are better movies of two hours length. I loved the actress'performance.

PiraBit if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

James Hitchcock Hollywood normally left films about British rule in India to the British themselves ("The Drum", "Black Narcissus", North West Frontier"), but "Bhowani Junction" is an exception. Certainly, John Masters' novel offered everything needed to make a thinking man's epic- an exotic setting, plenty of action, a thrilling finale and a serious theme, in this case racism. When Hollywood examined racial issues it often preferred to do so in the context of European colonialism rather than in the context of America itself. The film is set in the Indian railway town of Bhowani Junction in 1946, a year before independence. The British administrators are resigned to leaving India, but still hope to exercise an influence over the path the country will take after independence. Hence their preference for the Congress Party over the pro-Moscow Communist Party. After all Jawaharlal Nehru, the Congress leader, was a wealthy, patrician Fabian socialist, a lawyer by training, and educated at public school and Oxbridge (Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge)- just like the British Prime Minister Clement Attlee (Haileybury and University College, Oxford). According to this film the Communists are attempting to frustrate the handover of power to the Congress Party by acts of sabotage, hoping to create chaos which will enable them to seize power themselves. Moreover, some Congress activists are also trying to hasten the departure of the British by non-violent acts of resistance, although these often play into the hands of the Communists. Unusually for a film about the Raj, the film does not concentrate solely on relations between the British colonialists and the native peoples of India. Several of the leading characters are drawn from a third group, the country's Anglo-Indian, or mixed race, community. The Anglo-Indians were, and are, a distinct community within India, bound together by the English language, an Anglocentric culture and the Christian religion. The main character is Victoria Jones, the daughter of an Anglo-Indian train driver, and the film depicts the relationships between Victoria and the three men in her life, Colonel Rodney Savage, a senior British army officer, Ranjit Singh, a Sikh active in the Indian independence movement, and Patrick Taylor, an Anglo-Indian railway official. (Many Anglo-Indians worked on the railways). The fact that Victoria's lovers are drawn from the three different communities is symbolic of her uncertainty about her own cultural identity. The Anglo-Indians tended to identify culturally with Britain rather than India, although few of them had ever visited Britain, but were not fully accepted by either the British or the native Indians, both of whom referred to them by the same derogatory term, "chee-chee". It is noticeable that Victoria's attempts to fit in with British culture are not always successful. She refers to her parents by the Latin terms "pater" and "mater", unaware that in Britain this is an upper-class affectation; no British engine driver's daughter would speak in this manner. Patrick is also torn between different identities. He dislikes the British, largely because they will not accept him as one of them, but also despises full-blooded Indians, whom he refers to as "wogs" (another derogatory term). Savage is far more liberal and tolerant about matters of race. The crisis of the story comes when Victoria kills a British soldier while he is attempting to rape her. Although the killing was clearly in self-defence, she fears that the British authorities will not, on account of her mixed-race origins, believe her version of events, so she tries to conceal the incident, thus allowing herself to be blackmailed by the Communists into assisting with one of their schemes. I said that Masters' novel offered everything needed to make an epic, and overall the film is a pretty good one, combining an exciting adventure story with an intelligent look at some serious issues. Perhaps, however, I should have said say that it offered everything needed to make an epic bar one thing- a major role for a big-name American star. Hence the eccentric casting of Ava Gardner as Victoria, who never seems convincing as an Anglo-Indian and whose accent wavers between British, Indian and American. There were, in fact, two big-name Anglo-Indian cinema actresses around this period, Merle Oberon and Vivien Leigh, but both would probably have been too old for the role, and both normally passed as white. (Oberon, in particular, denied having any connection with India and claimed falsely to be Australian). Stewart Granger is very good as Savage, a man who can be cynical and sardonic but also liberal and humane. I was disappointed, however, that most of the Indian characters were played, with some very dodgy accents, by white actors. Perhaps the casting of Gardner seems less eccentric when one considers that the film-makers changed the ending of the novel, in which Victoria ends up marrying Patrick. An ending in which a dashing white officer loses out to a mixed-race railway bureaucrat would not be in keeping with normal cinema conventions, so it was changed; Patrick dies heroically and Victoria marries Savage. Racially mixed romances were, however, a controversial subject, for some reason felt to be more acceptable on screen if the mixed-race girl who loves the white boy was played by a white actress. The Eurasian heroine of "Love is a Many-Splendored Thing", for example, another American film set in a British colony, is played by Jennifer Jones. It is ironic that films which set out to expose racism in the British Empire should also have unconsciously revealed some of the racist attitudes which prevailed in the Hollywood Empire. 7/10

bkoganbing The setting for Bhowani Junction is India during the last days of the British Raj. The town of Bhowani is a railroad junction and both the Congress Party and the Communist Party are doing all kinds of sabotage to help the British quickly get out of India. Of course each is doing it for their own reasons.Two people who may have given the outstanding performances of their careers are Ava Gardner and Bill Travers. Both play bi-racial people who don't fit in either society. But they react differently. Gardner is going through a whole lot of angst, really seeing both the British and Indian point of view. How she missed an Oscar nomination here is beyond me.Bill Travers is the railroad station manager and his whole life is his job. He focuses narrowly on that and his tunnel vision leaves him oblivious to the momentous changes around him. Except for the fact that when the British leave he might lose that little piece of authority where he is, that which gives him stature in the Raj society. The issues are complex, but in the hands of a great director like George Cukor the characters and their struggles become real and even more important, the audience becomes interested.Stewart Granger who was the British Colonel in charge of the whole mess in Bhowani, said that Bhowani Junction was one of the few films he was really proud to be associated with. He has a struggle to, he really does see the Indians as human beings and not just "wogs." He's quite knowledgeable about their customs and at one point utilizes that knowledge to unjam that railroad terminal. Bhowani Junction is an intelligent and literate drama and a superb piece of film making.

mvfever Stars are the primary reason for me to watch old movies, because they just don't make them like that anymore. 'Bowani Junction' provides some of the best; Ava Gardner is so irresistibly attractive in this movie that watching her along is worth every penny spent for buying the copy. Better yet, other things in the film are also good. Granger, playing a more realistic role, is at his best elements as a daring arrogant English Col., match nicely with the beautiful Gardner as a romantic couple. Most of the Indian characters are well portrayed and I love movie with a historical background . The story is complicated ,yet well told and paced. The characters are interesting and well presented. Over all, this is Cukor's movie at its usual fine standard.This one is not to miss for fans of Granger, Gardner, and Hollywood oldies.

Jugu Abraham This film could have been wonderful if some of the parts had been given to Indian actors. For instance, Hollywood and British studios make believe that Indians speak English in a sing-song manner. They might have heavy accents but few speak English that way. Freda Jackson's role as "the Sadani" (could it have been an ignorant variation of "Sardarni"?) was incredibly stupid casting in that she spoke impeccable English for a middle-class Sikh lady. This apart Jackson was able to dominate her screen time.I would have liked to dismiss this film as a below average film but for the incredible performance of Ava Gardner who towers over all else in the movie. Take her accent--for an American, there was no trace of her origins when she spoke. She alone looked real with raven black hair in a sari draped in foppish manner--after all she was an Anglo-Indian. Had she worn well like an Aishwarya Rai, Cukor would have got it wrong.Cukor deserves full credit for choosing Gardner for the role and for capturing the ambiance of romantic North Western Railways, its first class coaches, the engines and goods wagons. A keen observer will note that some of the shots of goods wagons showed vintage wagons, while others showed contemporary ones.Though shot in Pakistan, the film caught the Indian ambiance perfectly, right up to the Railway quarters for its staff.Ava Gardner, it is only too evident, performed well under the guidance of good directors as John Houston. This film and "Night of Iguana" are my personal favourites among her films.