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Viceroy’s House (2017)
While the period-drama is an excellent medium for ‘learning’ history, stories of the past have better box-office prospects when fact and fiction are combined. Many films in this genre invent a love-story to humanise the bigger narrative and for this reason the exquisitely made Viceroy’s House (2017) combines two stories in one film: a sweeping historical epic of the last Raj and a classic Romeo and Juliet tale of forbidden love. Although films in this genre have responsibility for fact-based storytelling, we need to keep in mind that history itself is an amalgam of viewpoints rather than a single absolute truth.
The Second World War had left Britain almost bankrupt and her military might severely depleted. In 1947, after three centuries of colonial rule, Britain had no option but to ‘grant’ India independence. Lord and Lady Mountbatten (played by Hugh Bonneville and Gillian Anderson) had arrived into a political mess with the impossible task of peacefully withdrawing from India. There was widespread sectarian violence between Hindu, Muslim and Sikh populations, demands for independence were at fever-pitch, and a full-scale civil war was looming. Britain was ill-equipped to maintain peace or to protect its strategic assets, particularly against Russian expansionism. The British government’s political solution was to partition India, thereby creating the nation of Pakistan for its minority Muslim population, leaving the re-shaped Indian continent for its Hindu and Sikh people. The proclamation of independence and the partition precipitated the largest humanitarian crisis the world has seen: over a million died in the ensuing violence as fifteen million displaced refugees re-aligned their national loyalties with their religion.
Depicted as being at the epicentre of this historic political turmoil, the Viceroy’s House is also the cinematic frame for exploring the chaotic tragedy at human level. Woven into the bigger narrative is a love story between Hindu manservant Jeet (Manish Dayal) and Muslim handmaiden Aalia (Huma Qureshi). When the partition is announced, they are torn apart as she must move to the new Pakistan. The 500 servants in the palatial Mountbatten household spend most of the film squabbling in a microcosm of what is happening across the country. Each must choose which side of the partition they belong. Throughout the chaos, the Mountbattens are portrayed as benevolent but helpless instruments of historical and political forces.
A film that compresses a monumental story into one and three quarter hours will inevitably be both selective and reductive. As cinema, this is an outstanding work. The filming is sumptuous, the sets magnificently authentic, the acting is excellent, and the narrative unfolds with epic grandeur. For those who know little about the last Raj the film will fill many gaps. But as history, it is inevitably selective. Most glaring is the benign portrait of a compassionate departing colonial power. This glosses over the preceding centuries of exploitation and Britain’s duplicitous political posturing that resulted in tearing apart the Indian nation in the dying days of the Empire. Aside from that caveat, this is a superb production.
Director: Gurinder Chadha
Stars: Hugh Bonneville, Gillian Anderson, Manish Dayal, Huma Qureshi, Michael Gambon
CineMuseFilms 
I meant to see this yesterday at a morning tea event, but didn’t organise myself to go. I didn’t realise it covered this period, and I had qualms about Bonneville. So after all, I may give myself a shake-up and go. About twenty years ago I did see a film on the partition, it was harrowing, and included the effect on the Parsis (kind of caught in the cross-fire), and detailed some of the massacres. I still have elements of that film floating around in my head. It may even have been an Indian production – I can’t recall now.
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Bonneville does cast a pall of upstairs downstairs over the film, but not to its detriment. I knew so little about the history before seeing this great film. What a colossal event it was; no wonder it still impacts on the political relationships of this region.
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The emphasis on the smooth running of the house offers a new perspective on stories about partition and independence. Gillian Anderson is such a good actress. It’s Om Puri’s last performance and I would have liked more of his warmth and presence. I am enjoying reading your blog. It’s always good to see similarities and differences when one reads the thoughts of others.
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Welcome greercn and thank you for commenting. Smooth order is clearly a moral imperative in this very British approach to a complex event, a viewpoint that is both delightful and historically problematic.
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It does seem to put the needs of objects before the needs of people. I think that’s why the neutron bomb exists?
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While I would probably enjoy the overall sweep of the film, I suspect I might be intensely irritated by the ‘benevolent’ gloss cast over Britain’s colonialism and Mountbatten in particular. I believe there’s a very good argument for blaming him for the extent of the horror when you consider his decision to bring forward partition by a year, in spite of warnings about division and violence. And this decision must clearly have been coloured by the fact that Edwina was having an affair with Nehru.
And then there’s the atrocious miscasting of Bonneville. I think he’s a marvellous actor and interviewed him for Rogues & Vagabonds but he couldn’t be more wrong for a character like Mountbatten in my opinion. You’re going to ask me who I would cast instead, aren’t you? Nobody comes to mind at the moment but I’ll let you know if I think of someone!
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Thank you for such an interesting and provocative contribution. You seem to be speaking with a knowledge of events that are outside the film, like the ‘Edwina affair’. As for the film, it portrays Mountbatten as between a rock and a hard place. India was about to erupt anyway and he brought forward the event in the hope that it would lessen, not increase, the volatility of the situation. He is shown as a British pawn, not a leader. Bonneville is an unfortunate casting choice in many ways, but after the Downton Abbey cloud blows away, he is quite good in the role (IMO).
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I agree he was a pawn and he certainly didn’t want the responsibility but I believe his own character had as much to do with the decision as anything else. I’m certainly not an expert but from the books I’ve read over the years that have touched on the subject, articles I’ve read and documentaries I’ve seen, as well as a couple of forebears who had dealings with him, I would say he was clearly full of self-importance, no matter how charming he could be, and that the decision to bring it forward had possibly more to do with his feelings about Edwina’s affair than care for the situation or the people. I must say, though, that it seems odd for such a film not to have included the affair which must have coloured everything for him. Perhaps it wasn’t included because one of his daughters was an advisor! I have no doubt that Bonneville is good – he always is, miscast or not.
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Your comment ” I believe his own character had as much to do with the decision as anything else” has another layer of interpretation. I presume Mountbatten was chosen for this post because his character traits were well known by the British government. Impatience and self-importance would have assured a speedy exit. Your information about the affair is most interesting, both for what it says and why the film studiously omitted even a vague reference to it. Thanks for your comments.
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Interesting! I heard about it and the story is compelling for sure, I think.
Can’t wait to see how they’ve done it.
Thanks for the review!
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Thanks for commenting Dacian.
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