On DVD Now: Life of Pi

We snapped this one up the weekend of its release on DVD. For us, that’s unusual. Sure it won a bunch of awards, sure it was critically acclaimed, but was it actually any good?

We gave it a shot.

First and foremost the opening several minutes could easily be a presentation by the India tourist bureau. The scenery, the architecture, the wildlife, the rich, vivid colors were tremendously inviting.

I know a little about India and the cultures there. You can tell that by the way I used the plural form of 'culture'. India is a big-ass land mass. It boasts around a BILLION souls. That’s BILLION with a ‘B’. Three of them for every single American resident, legal and illegal. India is a land of wide diversity, rare is the stereotype that accurately spans the entire nation.

In the most recent iteration of my IT career, the last twelve or so years, I’ve had the good fortune to have known and worked with scores of fine people from India. Not a random scattering, admittedly, but scores of technically sharp, college educated and mostly articulate-English-speaking people from India. I’ve come to know a little about their cultures and their lives and have always been fascinated and impressed.

Theirs is a rich and ancient story mix of adversity and fortune, wealth and poverty. Their society is dotted with a wide variety of gods and demons, stories that predate Christianity by thousands of years. Bizarre tales that seem to us fantastic tall tales of magic and enchantment, betrayal and power-lust that make the Greek and Roman gods seem tame and boring in comparison.

My good friend and co-worker Ramesh once told me about the elephant-headed god that the little statue on his dashboard represented. “He clears obstacles.” He said to simplify the epic stories.

I admire Ramesh, he seems to personify  many of the ideals that I wish I could claim. He is a devoted husband, a doting father of a beautiful little girl, a dutiful son himself, and a cautious, meticulous worker. He is proud and patient. Whenever he is asked about his culture by any of us simple Americans he smiles and explains it in a simple and thorough narrative. He doesn’t take offense at our mistaken understandings, and does not correct us boastfully or arrogantly. He is a humble and polite man, and quick with a joke. Not unlike the movie’s main character, Pi.

In the movie, Pi, the adult version telling his life story, explains to the inquisitive Canadian writer, how he and others can easily be both Catholic and Hindu. “We get to feel guilt towards hundreds of gods, not just one.” He says with a winking smile.

I loved the way Hinduism was interlaced into the movie’s storyline, not proselytizing, rather explaining how the ancient religions that are Hinduism are a very prominent part of the people, and how understanding a little about the religion helps one better understand the people.

In evidence, the reluctance and conflict when Pi, stranded aboard a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger, and early on by an orangutan, a wounded zebra and a hyena, cannot justify killing any of the animals, even when faced with starvation or the teeth and claws of the hungry tiger itself. Upon clubbing a large fish to feed to the emaciated giant cat he weeps with pain and screams apologies to the fish, at the same time praising Vishnu for sending the fish to feed the tiger to keep the tiger from eating him. By this point in the film you get it, you really do.

That’s how good a job the writers and screen adapters did their job. You actually feel Pi’s pain for having to kill a fish to save his own life.

By now you know the crux of the story, Pi is raised by a family that runs a zoo. They decide to move to North America, so they load up all the animals into a Japanese freighter and they all set sail across the pacific.

Then there’s a terrible storm. So for most of the rest of the movie we have Pi and the Tiger in a battle of wits in a thirty-person lifeboat.

What about the other animals I mentioned? Did you not read the part about there being a hungry Bengal tiger aboard? Sheesh, this ain’t no Disney cartoon where the lions and lambs sleep and play together.

I was glad to see that the animals, even though they were almost entirely computer generated, were allowed to portray what they were, wild animals, not cute, talking, fluffy toys. Pi is made to understand this very thing by his father earlier in the story.

Without giving away the real twists and ending, I’ll just say this, the tiger and Pi never, ever kiss and make up or become bosom buddies. I was glad to see this; take that Gentle Ben, Tarzan, Daktari, Jungle Jim, and Elsa the cuddly lioness in “Born Free”.

I’ve mentioned that the animals were mostly CGI’d. Which leads me to the most stunning and pleasing aspects of the movie. The cinematography.

There were many places in the film that were obviously CGI. The animals tended to be a bit jerky at some points, their movements not fully perfected. But what really stood out were the fantasy scenes. As delirium and reality become harder for Pi to discriminate, we too, through absolutely vivid and bright, rich, compelling graphics and detail, are often mesmerized by the unearthly images before us. The brightly glowing jelly fish, the leaping great whale, the tens of thousands of meerkats on the lush, lime-green floating island, and more, much, much more. We don’t care whether it is real or imagined, we just want it to be real, it is real, at least for a moment.

The imagery is not just interwoven into the overall story, it is integral to the story. For the story itself is epic, fantasy-like and surreal, not unlike the many small Hindu stories laid out earlier in the film.

The movie is bright, spectacular and in several places quite funny. Though very dark, almost horrific at the core, Pi smiles, laughs and jokes often about the agonizing turns of fate. Even devout Christians can enjoy this movie, and would note the many similar story lines, not only of the boat full of animals, but also by the Job-like spiraling suffering and the steadfastness and resolve of Pi’s complex beliefs.

By the end of the film, the word I came up with was ‘Wow!’

I was entertained, thoroughly. I was not preached to, hit over the head, or tricked into liking the movie. There were no A-list celebrities at all, no one’s ruggedly handsome mug nor quaffed Hollywood perfection to steal scenes and attention from the story itself.

The movie makes many points, mostly subtle, but the one I came away with that stands out above the others is that it is not so important what the characters in a story are, often they are merely symbols. What is important are the life lessons learned form the stories, whether the story character be a tiger, a talking snake, a human living in a fish, an elephant headed god, these elements merely make the lesson more memorable, something even old Aesop recognized. You certainly remember those talking, magical animal morality tales don’t you?

What is important is making the story and the lessons memorable, and “Life of Pi” certainly masters this.

Highly recommended!