Fort Greene’s Trilok Fusion Arts will host
an "India Day Festival" on Nov. 21 and Nov. 23.
On Friday, at 6 pm, Fort Greene author Meera Nair will read from
her book of short stories, "Video" (Knopf, 2002), and
a documentary about arranged marriages in India, "A Match
Made in Calcutta" by filmmakers Francis Key Phillips and
Fort Greene resident Anand Kamalakar, will receive its Brooklyn
premiere. The picture won best film at the 2002 Mumbai International
Film Fest, according to Kamalakar.
Don’t miss this hour-long documentary, which is a heartbreaking
account of men and women who, for various reasons, have trouble
finding a spouse in a country where arranged marriages are the
norm. They participate in an "innovative new solution, the
Introduction Fair" which, if they find a match, will marry
them – a week later – in a mass wedding. The exquisitely adorned
brides are escorted into cars, sobbing and fearful of their new
roles as wives and daughters-in-law.
The filmmakers follow up with the men and women nine months after
the mass wedding only to hear even more heartrending stories.
The subjugation of the women reaches its nadir when one elder
recommends that an allegedly abused wife, already crippled by
polio, commit suicide rather than pursue a divorce.
The program on Sunday is a considerably more uplifting assortment
of Indian music and dance. At 3 pm, vocalist Marina Alam will
perform north Indian classical music, artist Anuradha Krishnamurthy
will perform south Indian classical music and Sudha Seetharaman
(pictured) will perform classical Indian dance to the jazz music
of the Julian Velard Trio in "Ramayana."
The festival events take place at ART New York/South Oxford Space,
138 South Oxford St. between Atlantic Avenue and Hanson Place.
Tickets are $10 a day, $17 for both days, and can be reserved
by calling (718) 398-0333.
