Amu - DVD

Riveting tale of a young woman's search for her roots
Shonali Bose's "Amu" is based on her novel of the same name and tells the story of Kaju, an American of Indian origin who goes back to Delhi, India to visit her relatives and unearth the secret of her past. Kaju [Konkona Sen Sharma] is an adopted child, and has always been interested to know more about her birth parents, but her adoptive mother refuses to divulge any details, leaving the young woman frustrated and yearning to uncover her past.

She meets a new friend, Kabir [Ankur Khanna] a young man who also happens to be the only son of a wealthy and influential politician. Together they visit the slums of Delhi, making friends amongst the slum dwellers. Kaju's recollection of the slum in the past convinces her that her past must be tied to the slums, and she does some detective work on her own, uncovering a horrific secret about her past in the process, which is also tied to the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in New Delhi which claimed the lives of approximately 5,000 Sikhs...

"How Can You, O River Ganga" ~ Is it Ever OK Not To Know The Truth?
Note: The film is presented in Hindi with English subtitles.

Synopsis: twenty something Kaju leaves the comfortable confines of America and returns to her native India to rediscover her birth heritage. In the process of the usual site seeing and other exotic tourist distractions she finds herself drawn repeatedly back to a slum area in Deli. She experiences an indescribable affinity for the place and begins to have what appear to be flashbacks of a childhood she had long since forgotten.

Eventually a series of personal revelations begin to unfold to Kaju which center around this run down habitat and a tragic event from the past, the riots of '84 where 5 to 10 thousand Sikhs lost their lives. In her search to understand her Indian roots she finds much more than the secret of her own personal past. She discovers a past that India would sooner leave unexamined.

Critique: `Amu' exemplifies what independent filmmaking should be all about: solid...

Amazon is selling used discs as new.
I haven't watched the movie yet, but the disc Amazon sent me was a scruffy & smudged used disc. After paying $20, I'm not happy.

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