Manto Comes to Los Angeles
By Ahmad Uzair
Recently on a fine Sunday afternoon, I had the opportunity to attend the screening of ‘Manto’ organized by Pakistan Arts Council of USC Pacific Asia Museum at Pasadena Central Library. Despite a 45-minute drive, the beautiful weather made it all worthwhile to head to Pasadena to watch the movie over chai and cookies.
The movie is based on the lifetime of Saadat Hasan Manto, a celebrated Urdu short story writer, and showcased a diverse range of subjects that affected Manto’s writings. It also includes his personal life throughout the years,especially during the pre- and post- partition era.
Originally released in 2015, the movie is directed by Sarmad Khoosat who also acts in the movie playing the lead ‘Manto’ himself.
The story line was an amalgamation of multiple short stories penned by Manto himself that provided an intricate view of how Manto saw the issues residing in the society at the time. And one cannot help but wonder how some of the things are still relevant and relatable even in this day and age.
The scenes from the partition of the sub-continent shown in the movie were riveting and gut-wrenching at the same time. Leaving one’s city can be very tragic for any one and Manto is shown having a special bond with Bombay where he started his career. His struggles to leave behind Bombay and move to Lahore and the accompanying trauma fondly reminded me of a line from Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s famous poem “Subh-e-Azadi’ which goes: “ Wo intezaar tha jiska ye wo seher tau nahi, Ye wo seher tau nahin, jis ki arzu le kar”. It loosely translates to “This is not that long-awaited day break; This is not the dawn in whose longing,”
Post-screening, I heard a few people saying that the movie was a bit too intense and unsettling for a Sunday afternoon, which was true to some extent. However, it gave an interesting insight in to the life and times of Manto.
One must not forget to give credit to Jamal Rehman who did a great job with the background score of the movie. I especially liked “Kon Hai Ye Gustakh” by Javed Bashir. Bashir with his usual haunting yet powerful vocals adds a new dimension and layer of complexity to the story line. And how can one miss the lovely “Mundiya Sialkotiya” that plays periodically throughout the movie, originally sung by Madam Noor Jehan. This song, and the character of Noor Jehan played by Saba Qamar, also sheds some light on the relationship between her and Manto.
It was my second time attending an event with PAC-USC and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Not just the movie, but the event in itself was a success with great turnout.
There was also a small table setup by an organization called “Be The Match” at the screening. They are a global leader in bone marrow transplantation and also collect database for bone marrow matches for cancer patients. It was a startling discovery for me that every 3 minutes someone is diagnosed with blood cancer and every 10 minutes someone dies from it. Only 1 in 430 people will match a patient’s ethnic heritage and South Asian ethnicities have specially a hard time finding the right match.
‘Be The Match’ encourages young adults to register with them as potential donors. To find more details about their program, you can simply text ImTheCure to 61474 or visit https://bethematch.org/
For somebody who has recently moved to Los Angeles, I feel Pakistan Arts Council is doing a wonderful job in bringing the Pakistani community together and giving a platform to encourage discussions about arts and culture.
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