A review of the 1983 film “Heat and Dust”
One of the great collaborative teams of British cinema was the trio of director James Ivory, producer Ismail Merchant and writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala and “Heat And Dust” was one of their most successful enterprises.Based on the eponymous novel by Jhabvala and set largely in northern India, it tells two parallel stories located in different time periods: the early life of Olivia (a first leading role for Greta Scacchi), the new and young wife of a member of the British administration in the India of the 1923, and her modern-day, slightly older, step-granddaughter Anne (the established star Julie Christie who was actually born in British India) who comes across Olivia’s letters to her sister and decides to visit the locations mentioned and try to understand better what happened. This narrative device enables the two protagonists to have similar experiences but make different choices. The film is beautifully shot and brilliantly acted.
Some reviewers criticised the work as presenting a kind of heritage or nostalgic view of empire but this is not fair. This is not a film about empire as such, but two coming-of-age portraits of young women set against cultural challenges and, while the injustices of colonialism are not fore-fronted, they are not overlooked. I’ve seen “Heat And Dust” three times – most latterly at the British Film Institute with an introduction by a film historian – and now I really must read the novel.