Classic inspirational movie: The Biography of Gandhi
"The Biography of Gandhi" is a feature film directed by Richard Attenborough and starring Ben Kingsley.
The film begins with a flashback from the assassination of Gandhi. In the 1890s, India was still under British colonial rule. While traveling in South Africa, the young lawyer Gandhi witnessed the bullying of his compatriots and determined to fight for the rights of his compatriots. After returning home, Gandhi advocated a policy of non-violence and traveled across the country to win the trust and love of poor people.
Plot synopsis
The film begins with a preface: No one’s life can be included in one story, and it is impossible to give equal time to what happens every year. Due to the length, including all the characters related to the incident can only be spiritually consistent with the original spiritual outlook of the characters. Don't miss important events, and express the characters' life purpose and spiritual outlook through these events?
The film begins with a grand funeral for Gandhi in India on January 31, 1948, and then goes back to 1893, when the young lawyer Gandhi was only 24 years old. He received higher education in the UK for four years. He had a court case in South Africa and was kicked out of a first-class train because of his skin color. This was the first time in his life that Gandhi experienced the insult of racial discrimination. From then on, he made up his mind to devote himself to the struggle for equal rights for the 800,000 Indian expatriates living in South Africa. He set up a law firm in Johannesburg and went deep into the Indian masses to educate and enlighten them. He brought his wife and children from India to express his determination to carry out a long struggle. During his 21 years in South Africa, he carried out a lot of work.
In 1906, Gandhi promoted the ideas of satyagraha and non-violence for the first time. He led Indians to protest against the South African authorities' proposal to illegally cancel Indians' voting rights. He held demonstrations and collected signatures from Indians, and later established the Congress Party, the earliest organization of South African Indians fighting for civil rights. He called on Indians not to register and fingerprint with the South African authorities, and organized his followers to go on strike with South African railway workers to oppose the oppression of railway workers by the South African authorities. Some Indians were arrested for going on strike or demonstrating, and Gandhi gathered their families together. He used the money raised from some wealthy people and people in India to build a farm with 1,100 acres of land for them, allowing these family members to live a new and simple working life there. He taught the young people there to study his doctrines and work hard. He himself was imprisoned and beaten several times during the struggle. In 1914, he returned to India and actively participated in the struggle to get rid of British colonial rule and strive for independence and self-government. He still insisted on going deep into the masses to promote his ideas of satyagraha and non-violence. The film especially depicts non-violence in great detail. For example, in order to resist the monopoly of the salt industry in India by the British colonial rulers, he led the people to walk 200 miles to the seaside salt fields in protest. As a result, the British government dispatched a large number of military and police officers to beat up the unarmed people. However, the crowd continued to move forward and did not fight back in protest. At this time, the camera of the film was focused on the military police armed with sticks and whips. The crowd could not see the victims and could only hear the groans off-screen. In 1918, in order to protest against the dismissal of workers in British textile factories, Gandhi encouraged workers to petition the factory owners, but he asked them to be gentle and polite like asking his father to avoid offending the factory owners. Another manifestation of Gandhi's non-violence was the hunger strike. He went on several hunger strikes to protest against the mass riots in Calcutta and to promote unity among India's various sects.
The film spends a lot of time showing him lying there dying, eating nothing but a little lime juice. Gandhi's satyagraha and non-violent struggle finally allowed the British colonial rulers to transfer power and India became officially independent in January 1948.
When the whole country celebrated independence with joy, Gandhi did not attend the celebrations and was worried because he saw the contradictions within the Indian National Congress and the increasingly intensified struggles among various sects in India. Four days after India's independence, Gandhi was assassinated.
Movie evaluation
The film starts from the grand funeral of the protagonist, using the host’s words to roughly outline Gandhi’s extraordinary life. Then the camera flashed back to fifty-five years ago, when young Gandhi was a young, promising and high-spirited lawyer recognized by the British Empire. But the experience of being thrown off the train was like a slap in the face, making him deeply aware of the shame brought by racial discrimination. In order to wash away this shame, Gandhi spent his entire life. When showing Gandhi, the most "divine" figure, the film completely breaks away from the stereotype of deliberate beautification and adopts a humanistic perspective.
The second half of the film vividly depicts the shocking racial vendetta, allowing the audience to repeatedly struggle with Gandhi in this catastrophe, making it difficult to escape, and allowing the poison of hatred to slowly soak into our original tolerance. mind. Kingsley was the undisputed winner of the Academy Award for his vivid portrayal of the challenging role of Gandhi. The film won 8 Oscars (55th Academy Awards) including Best Picture. ;