It is the 1940s in Lucknow. A young college student questions the imperial colonisation of the education he receives at the University with his professor, only to be silenced for the moment, and a revolutionary is born. Swami Chinmayananda’s biopic, On a Quest, attempts to capture the many facets of his life: from his ideal childhood spent with his pious mother and father in Ernakulam, Kerala to a young college student in the politically charged student campus of Lucknow University, from a freedom fighter who worked in the enemy den to a student union leader on the run from the British, from days of torture spent in jail, working as a journalist idealistic about the new nation that he wanted to free from the scourge of superstition and poverty, the oppression of caste and class to his spiritual reawakening.
The film is not above laughing at itself, especially in parts where we see young Balan (Chinmayananda’s name before his spiritual awakening) questioning his Guru at the Divine Life Society, as he is out to expose him (and other sadhus worshipped in the country) as a fraud by writing a report on his ways. The dialogues are crisp, and the editing makes sure that the plot doesn’t slack. The film shifts character easily if a little simplistically from one stage to another, using the plot device of a young “free thinker” in the present who seeks to learn about Swami Chinmayananda’s life. We move from the charged atmosphere of pre-Independence India to the austere landscape of the film when Balan decides to follow his spiritual quest. Most important, however, is the fact that the biopic captures the essence of a free thinker’s spiritual journey, a tall task that is told simply, even for the uninitiated. The shoot at Rishikesh, for instance, had Sandeep going to the barber thrice, one when he is portrayed with long hair, one with a short crop as a journalist, and the third when he is clean shaven before getting initiated. The one day shoot had him running to the barber thrice in a day, but the film, unlike the hectic schedule of the production done on a tight schedule has peace as its defining quality.
by Payel Majumdar
link – http://www.sunday-guardian.