Between Monsoon Wedding and Behind Enemy Lines

Abstract

ALL GENERALISATIONS ARE FALSE: BETWEEN MONSOON WEDDING AND BEHIND ENEMY LINES To start at the end of Monsoon Wedding: hidden amongst the end credits, as a roller caption goes by, cutting to fast flashbacks of shots from the exhilarating musical finale, there is concealed amongst the lists of production personnel a three line note: "We are like that.40 locations 30 days.exactly and approximately." There are always the perverse pleasures of discovering a hidden code -- there at the edge of the text. (I remember the most radical aspect of Pier Paolo Pasolini's Salò, aside from the explicit sexual cruelty, was the bibliography he supplied in the end credits: Barthes, De Sade, Sollers). It is only cinephiles who stay in the emptying cinema for the credits and then amongst them only a tiny minority who would understand an obscure reference to the shoot schedule. "We are...