I Will Be Exploring The Short Film Surviving Sabu Which Was Written And Directed By Ian Iqbal Rashid In 1998
Explore the presentation of Orientalist discourses in the short film Surviving Sabu.
I will be exploring the short film Surviving Sabu which was written and directed by Ian Iqbal Rashid in 1998, with reference to the 1942 film The Jungle Book. My analysis will question the presentation of Indian and Muslim identities in both films.
Surviving Sabu presents the relationship between two characters: a father and his son. The family have immigrated to England at some point in recent decades, although the audience is never told when or specifically where from. The characters have anonymity, we are not even told their names. They could be two individuals of any migrant Indian, Muslim family, and the son concludes that this is all that they are perceived to be, ‘just a paki’. Their exploration of Sabu Dastagir combines with a discussion on ‘race, colonialism and masculinity’.1 Edward Said concludes that identity cannot be constructed without an idea of difference. The Occident is presented as having a sense of self, ‘“we” as the Westerners’, while the Orient, as ‘the Other’ or simply ‘Them’, is deprived of this. The Orient’s presentation as voiceless allows the Occident to extenuate moral responsibility to speak ‘on behalf’. Marx is quoted by Said to expand upon this concept, ‘they cannot represent themselves; they must be represented’.2 White American actor Joseph Calleia as ‘Buldeo’ in ‘The Jungle Book’ Sabu Dastagir was an Indian actor who appeared in many Hollywood films throughout the 1940’s. Dastagir was born in India and scouted by an American film crew. It would have been an extremely rare experience to see a person of colour take a lead role during this time, for instance in The Jungle Book Dastagir is almost exclusively the only Indian actor. All the other main characters are played by white actors in ‘blackface’. The father character describes Dastagir as ‘triumphing’ over racism, while the son perceives him as merely a ‘colonialist dream’. The
I will be exploring the short film Surviving Sabu which was written and directed by Ian Iqbal Rashid in 1998, with reference to the 1942 film The Jungle Book. My analysis will question the presentation of Indian and Muslim identities in both films.
Surviving Sabu presents the relationship between two characters: a father and his son. The family have immigrated to England at some point in recent decades, although the audience is never told when or specifically where from. The characters have anonymity, we are not even told their names. They could be two individuals of any migrant Indian, Muslim family, and the son concludes that this is all that they are perceived to be, ‘just a paki’. Their exploration of Sabu Dastagir combines with a discussion on ‘race, colonialism and masculinity’.1 Edward Said concludes that identity cannot be constructed without an idea of difference. The Occident is presented as having a sense of self, ‘“we” as the Westerners’, while the Orient, as ‘the Other’ or simply ‘Them’, is deprived of this. The Orient’s presentation as voiceless allows the Occident to extenuate moral responsibility to speak ‘on behalf’. Marx is quoted by Said to expand upon this concept, ‘they cannot represent themselves; they must be represented’.2 White American actor Joseph Calleia as ‘Buldeo’ in ‘The Jungle Book’ Sabu Dastagir was an Indian actor who appeared in many Hollywood films throughout the 1940’s. Dastagir was born in India and scouted by an American film crew. It would have been an extremely rare experience to see a person of colour take a lead role during this time, for instance in The Jungle Book Dastagir is almost exclusively the only Indian actor. All the other main characters are played by white actors in ‘blackface’. The father character describes Dastagir as ‘triumphing’ over racism, while the son perceives him as merely a ‘colonialist dream’. The
Bibliography: Michel Foucault, Power/ Knowledge, (Brighton: Harvester, 1980) Gikandi, Simon, “Picasso, Africa and the Schemata of Difference”, Modernism/Modernity, 10 (3) (2003) Gilroy, Paul, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness (London: Verso,1993) Gopinath, Gayatri, Impossible Desires: Queer Diasporas and South Asian Public Cultures, (Durham, Duke University Press: 2005) Surviving Sabu, dir. Ian Iqbal Rashid, (Frameline Voices, 1998) Pratt, Marie Louise, “Arts of the Contact Zone”, in Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation, (London: Routledge, 1992) Said, Edward, Orientalism (London, Penguin: 1978) Greenblatt, Stephan, “Resonance and Wonder”, in Learning to Curse: Essays in Early Modern Culture, (New York: Routledge, 1990) The Jungle Book, dir. Zoltan Korda, (Alexander Korda Films, 1942)