I read quite a few of Ms. Prawer Jhabvala's books when I was younger and I can especially remember liking "The Householder" about the trials and tribulations of a newly married teacher. For many years Shashi Kapoor was India's biggest star. Starting in 1956 as an 18 year old he was both actor and assistant stage manager for the "Prithvi Theatre". He was also one of India's first film stars to go international, becoming associated with James Ivory on "The Householder", Ivory's first directorial feature. Satyajit Ray, a legend of Indian film making also extended an important influence on the production, including the supervision of the music.
The film is told in flashback as Prem (Kapoor) offers his worldly reminiscences (he has been married a year!!!) to a despondent bridegroom he meets at a wedding.
Married life is very confusing to young Prem and not at all the way it was under his mother's roof - how he longs to return there!!! Indu (Leela Naidu is just enchanting, it is a pity she made so few films) is not tidy - his mother was "spick and span", she reads and what is worse, she has opinions. On top of this, he is a young teacher who cannot keep order in his own class room - going to work is a nightmare. Indu shames him in every way - when the principal invites the staff and their wives to a morning tea, she ignores the other wives as she is too busy eating!!! They are also very poor and find it hard to survive on Prem's low pay - of course he thinks she is extravagant!! Indu, on the other hand, can remember her childhood when her slightest wish was granted and good times were the order of the day.
When things look their bleakest (he now finds he is to be a father) he impulsively wires his mother. Too late!! by the time she has arrived he is already regretting sending for her but she still succeeds in turning the house upside down with her commands and complaints!! Shashi Kapoor excellently conveys the confused feelings of a young "householder". He asks advice from everyone he knows and starts to go on a spiritual journey to seek enlightenment. He becomes acquainted with a group of "new age" Americans - a professor, a young man and a free thinking older woman. They have come to India to experience "becoming", "cosmic energy" and "meditation" - they don't believe Indian's appreciate their own country. When Prem's wife leaves him, they have no answers as disillusionment on their part has already set in. Prem then turns to a Swarmi....
This is a lovely, relaxing movie to watch. A big surprise for me was to find the Professor was played by Walter King. Amazingly the same Walter Woolf King I had seen only a month or two previously in the 1935 Jane Wither's movie "Ginger".
The film is told in flashback as Prem (Kapoor) offers his worldly reminiscences (he has been married a year!!!) to a despondent bridegroom he meets at a wedding.
Married life is very confusing to young Prem and not at all the way it was under his mother's roof - how he longs to return there!!! Indu (Leela Naidu is just enchanting, it is a pity she made so few films) is not tidy - his mother was "spick and span", she reads and what is worse, she has opinions. On top of this, he is a young teacher who cannot keep order in his own class room - going to work is a nightmare. Indu shames him in every way - when the principal invites the staff and their wives to a morning tea, she ignores the other wives as she is too busy eating!!! They are also very poor and find it hard to survive on Prem's low pay - of course he thinks she is extravagant!! Indu, on the other hand, can remember her childhood when her slightest wish was granted and good times were the order of the day.
When things look their bleakest (he now finds he is to be a father) he impulsively wires his mother. Too late!! by the time she has arrived he is already regretting sending for her but she still succeeds in turning the house upside down with her commands and complaints!! Shashi Kapoor excellently conveys the confused feelings of a young "householder". He asks advice from everyone he knows and starts to go on a spiritual journey to seek enlightenment. He becomes acquainted with a group of "new age" Americans - a professor, a young man and a free thinking older woman. They have come to India to experience "becoming", "cosmic energy" and "meditation" - they don't believe Indian's appreciate their own country. When Prem's wife leaves him, they have no answers as disillusionment on their part has already set in. Prem then turns to a Swarmi....
This is a lovely, relaxing movie to watch. A big surprise for me was to find the Professor was played by Walter King. Amazingly the same Walter Woolf King I had seen only a month or two previously in the 1935 Jane Wither's movie "Ginger".