{"id":6767,"date":"2016-03-04T10:53:38","date_gmt":"2016-03-04T05:23:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=6767"},"modified":"2016-03-04T10:53:38","modified_gmt":"2016-03-04T05:23:38","slug":"cargo-review-a-universal-fable-of-loneliness-in-space-light-years-away-from-indian-sci-fi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=6767","title":{"rendered":"Cargo Review: A Universal Fable of Loneliness in Space Light Years Away From Indian Sci-Fi"},"content":{"rendered":"\nT<\/span>here are no humans in Arati Kadav\u2019s Cargo<\/em>, a deceptively introspective sci-fi film about connection and isolation<\/a>. There are only \u201ccargos\u201d \u2013 recently deceased men and women who are readied for rebirth aboard a spaceship by Prahastha (Vikrant Massey), a celebrated demon<\/a> responsible for hundreds of reincarnations through the decades. The film opens in 2027 in a world where \u201chomo rakshasas,\u201d the modern descendants of mythical demons have entered the Space Age after signing a peace treaty with humans 75 years ago.\n\nAs part of the treaty, six spaceships were launched by the Post Death Transition Services (PDTS) manned by astronauts<\/a> entrusted with administering rebirth to the \u201ccargos\u201d who make their way to the spaceship right after they die. Prahastha, who commands Pushpak 634 A, one of the six spaceships, heals the bodies of the departed, wipes their memories, stores their souls before sending them back to Earth to be born again with clinical precision.\n\nHe has been tirelessly floating in space and living a life of monotony for the last 75 years. At times, the dead bodies feel more alive than him. Cargo<\/em>, like most films about space and loneliness, is then an inverted story about the healer being in urgent need of healing. So it\u2019s a given that Prahastha\u2019s life of monotony<\/a> would be questioned by the arrival of someone new \u2013 in this case, Yuvishka (Shweta Tripathi), a youthful assistant more open to the world than him.\n\n

Cargo<\/em>, like most films about space and loneliness, is then an inverted story about the healer being in urgent need of healing.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\nA familiar tale rendered strange<\/strong>\n\nBut what differentiates Kadav\u2019s vision is the film\u2019s cultural ingenuity. The solitude of space is universal, and by now, a familiar tale (Gravity<\/em>, Ad Astra<\/em>, Moon<\/em>, Solaris<\/em>, The Martian<\/em>). Kadav, who makes her writing and directorial debut is aware of that and instead, defines the emotional core of Cargo<\/em> in the specificity of its world-building. The universe of space in this movie is unlike any other; it is rooted inherently in the homegrown grammar of Indian mythology<\/a>.\n\nFor instance, the astronauts manning the spaceships are ageless demons who are\u00a0 exactly like humans, except that they each have a superpower<\/a>. Prahastha is himself named after the chief commander of Ravana\u2019s army and his demon supervisors mirror the indolence of the innumerable sarkari babus down on Earth. The corporatisation of death in Cargo<\/em> is a family inheritance; the CEO of PDTS is related to Yama, the lord of death. A voiceover informs the viewer of an astronaut\u2019s imminent retirement \u2013 he is named Duryodhan.\n\nEven the deadpan black comedy is underlined with impossibly Indian eccentricities: Cargo<\/em> opens with a hilarious \u201cfeature presentation from Earth,\u201d one that has an international loneliness detective (Biswapati Sarkar in an enjoyable cameo) dissuade depressed humans from killing themselves. He reminds them of the services that he can offer, which include him coming to their houses, eating their food, and sharing their bed to cure them of their loneliness. The advertisement is naturally shot on a crowded local train, the best possible confluence of secretly lonely strangers.\n\nThen, Kadav uses a kitschy reality show that plays in the background as a recurring device (apt for a voyeuristic country) to parody the inconveniences that the bizarre superpowers present in the lives of the demons and they too suffer from similar societal indignities as humans, like a rising rate of unemployment<\/a> and employee strikes.\n\n

The corporatisation of death in Cargo<\/em> is a family inheritance; the CEO of PDTS is related to Yama, the lord of death.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\nThe arrival of a unique voice in filmmaking\u00a0<\/strong>\n\nThe inventiveness of a space film like Cargo<\/em> \u2013 a genre that isn\u2019t usually embraced by Indian filmmakers, much less considered the domain of female filmmakers \u2013 doesn\u2019t lie merely in how Kadav crafts the minutiae of the universe in a way that it is instantly recognisable and ingenious. It\u2019s how she bypasses the assumptions and limitations of what constitutes the sci-fi genre, generally slotted as big-budget cumbersome outings.\n\nThe subversions almost feel like a third protagonist and the ambition of the film is its audacity, a testament to the arrival of a truly unique filmmaking voice. In fact, the film\u2019s casting follows that route: Both Tripathi and Massey deliver sentimental performances that are at once minimalistic and attuned to the stripped-down production design of Cargo<\/em>. Just like the film, their turns aren\u2019t as conventionally moving as you\u2019d expect them to be, but there\u2019s a certain conviction in how they hold back that informs the proceedings instead of burdening it. That the plot meanders after the halfway mark is but a minor hiccup, given that Kadav has chops to spare, bringing alive the frustrations of longing with such vivid tenacity that it makes the distance between connecting and isolating that much more piercing.\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The solitude of space is a universal, and by now, familiar tale (think Gravity or The Martian). Arati Kadav, who makes her writing and directorial debut is aware of that. But the universe of space in Cargo is unlike any other; it is rooted in the homegrown grammar of Indian mythology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":6768,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3114],"tags":[10804,10805,10806,10807,10502,6104,7868,3595],"class_list":["post-6767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bollywood","tag-arati-kadav","tag-cargo","tag-cargo-review","tag-indian-mythology","tag-isolation","tag-sci-fi","tag-shweta-tripathi","tag-vikrant-massey"],"yoast_head":"\nCargo Review: A Universal Fable of Loneliness in Space Light Years Away From Indian Sci-Fi<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The solitude of space is a universal, and by now, familiar tale (think Gravity or The Martian). Arati Kadav, who makes her writing and directorial debut is aware of that. 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