Corrupted to the core?

Nile Hilton Incident (Arabic/Egyptian; 2017)
Written/Directed: Tarik Saleh

Every time a new law comes into force, guess who the happy people are. No, not the law-abiding citizens or the patriots who want to see rule and order respected in this country. It is the lowly local enforcers - the front-liners who are there to ensure that the law is respected. There are the first to detect any wrongdoing at the ground level and could squash a ticket, at a nominal fee, of course. 

Everyone is happy. The poorly paid constables and local council employees get on by tying up loose ends - maybe a child's birthday present or that emergency trip to the hometown. 

The problem is that this kind of 'closing an eye' or 'I scratch your back, you scratch mine' attitude has infiltrated all strata of the civil service. What we see now are the accusations of so-and-so of the higher pecking order being charged for siphoning off funds and dishonestly performing their civil duties. Invariably, these events will merely turn up to be a storm in a teacup.

Fearing a backlash to the whole government machinery, the powers-that-be would hush everything. After all, the foxes appointed to guard the coop feel it is the ordained right to benefit from their post after years of hard work and sacrifice. With the increasing cost of living and exposure to the high life, they have only a few more years to ensure continued prosperity in their retired life and their offspring. Whatever is said and done, the rot is across the board. The words integrity, efficiency and civil service cannot be strung in the same sentence.

If we remember the early years of the 21st century in the Middle East, this catalysed the Arab Spring movement. What started as a jobless graduate failing to secure a hawker site in Libya and immolating himself in protest, the governments raised up to get their acts together. So, for a short while, at least.

In Egypt, in 2011, in Tahrir Square specifically, the people's power managed to oust Hosni Mubarak, the undisputed strongman of Egypt. Using this event as a build to the climax, this film showcases the widespread corruption and culture of protecting the high-heeled and politicians in the law enforcement units in Egypt.

Noredin, a police officer obviously not at the highest of the virtue scale, is called to investigate the death of a singer at Nile Hilton. Noredin has no qualms about pocketing extra cash from his dead victims and looking the other way if offenders are willing to dole out a little spare money. 

Slowly he realises that the whole force is corrupt to the core. Many of his superiors are on the take. Many high-level politicians are linked to the crime he is investigating, and he is helpless in completing his investigations. Vice is widespread, and pimps are kings. 

A Sudanese housekeeping assistant who witnessed the murder, meanwhile, is on the run from the corrupt police and colluding thugs. The film climaxes at the Tahrir Square demonstrations. The whole debacle leaves a horrible aftertaste. The demonstration gives the image as if all the slime brewing in the trenches just bubbles over.

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The attractions too hard to resist....

To Leslie (2022)
Director: Michael Morris

When you laugh, everyone laughs with you. When you cry, you not only cry alone, the whole world laughs at you. You also know that winning a lottery only solves a few of your problems. On the contrary, it creates more issues and shows who your real friends are. No one becomes rich after winning a lottery.

Another thing. The whole architecture of modern society is set up to make your life a decadent one. It makes partying enjoyable. Extragavance is revered. Alcohol is hailed as an indispensable social lubricant. The media promotes, and society encourages its usage. Nobody talks neither about its addictive nature nor of its destructive potential. But still, when a country is red and needs money, booze and cigarettes are the first things to be taxed under the heading of sin tax.

Society glamourises smoking as if it spurs the creative juices but fails to mention the respiratory ailments, the dependence and the expense that ensues. To top it up, many creative musical compositions were apparently composed under the influence of mind-altering substances. The media also advertises high-flying lifestyles and horse racing like a sine-quo-non of life. They conveniently omit the fine print of the danger of living in credit and bankruptcy.

Just how much can an average being can control his urges. One needs to have enormous willpower to remain sane in modern life.

'To Leslie' brilliantly tells us what happens after the money earned from a lottery goes dry. Reality hits the winner when the party lights dim and the money for drugs and booze fizzles out. Lack of prudence makes Leslie live door-to-door in a suitcase, and she loses the only love of her life, her now adult son. The film narrates how Leslie struggles to get her act together, stay sober and get in the good books of her beloved son. In the meantime, she finds love from a soul who truly understands her predicament.

Good acting and a good message, but we have all seen too many similar real-life instances to predict how everything will unfold.

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We built this city!

Once upon a time in Calcutta (2021)
Director: Aditya Vikram Sengupta

Like Mother Nature @ Bhoomadevi, who has seen it all, like the dinosaurs' passing, and various primates and species morphing into Homosapiens, great cities have seen it all too.

Admittedly all cities expanded and developed to their present glorious states, not via virtuous paths but through acts of sin. Show me one still-standing city that did not benefit from actions considered unholy transactions. They all benefitted from shady nightlife activities, brothels, alcohol, smuggling, racketeering, and robbing, you name it. 

Still, life goes on. Umpteen people migrate to cities daily with a chest full of hope. Many manage to improve their lives, breaking their backs, sleepless but with a restless dream with the sole intention of climbing the ladder of success. Some falter, crushed by their enormous goals, obviously too big for the shoulders to carry. The city has seen the successes, the decadence, the swindling and the ploys. Its duty is not to punish. It merely records to play for anyone willing to hear the lessons of what lurks behind the bright city lights.

As far as nostalgia is concerned, Calcutta must surely be a city that has many tales to tell. After functioning as the capital of the British Empire and later as the site of many bloody turmoils following Partition, its past must be painted in blood, sweat and tears. Now, in 21st-century independent India, it morphs yet again. Buildings and statues that were grand then have become eyesores and need to be deconstructed.

Against this background is where this movie is set.

Ela is an ageing actress who has many things on her plate. Her young daughter's death has drawn her to the bottle and destroyed her relationship with her husband. They live under the same roof but lead separate lives. Ela is trying to get a loan to buy a house to move out, but she has no money. She had spent all her savings on her daughter's illness.

Ela may jointly own her late father's old and run-down family house. The problem is that Ela's late mother was a cabaret dancer and her father's mistress. Ela's half-brother, Bubu, blames the mistress for his own mother's suicide and refuses to give Ela any access to the property.

Bubu gets increasingly paranoid about his servants. The almost single Ela has suitors of her own. She reconnects with her old flame, and a proprietor of a Ponzi scheme showers her with gifts. The ugly side of the whole city network soon comes to the surface. The Ponzi scheme collapses, and Ela's old flame's new highway collapses. 

It appears that city is a scavenger and is hungry for more and more, but remember that people make cities.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.