The Square Circle

The Square Circle was, alas, shown with 20 minutes of songs cut out. But the film’s pulse and generosity are still evident. The singer (played with poignancy by Bandit Queen’s Nirmal Pandey) gets drawn into romance but never has to renounce his gayness. The coming of age of the young woman is limned with wit and affection.  Hats off to screenwriter Timeri Murari. – Richard Corliss, TIME magazine.

. – Writer Timeri N. Murari offers an Indian film that does constitute some kind of break through, examining sexual identity and gender stereotyping.  This strange, sad road movie of sorts delicately probes complex issues, showing that marriage, can be a blessing and a trap, and that relationships are often forged at the intersection of romance, duty and companionship. THE OBSERVER.

-“ this is an intriguing film when Murari’s script is allowed to take wing…”  Derek Malcolm, THE GUARDIAN.

-“ Timeri Murari’s film puts the melos back into melodrama and the sense (and sensitivity) into sensationalism.” Nigel Andrews, THE FINANCIAL TIMES.

On this evidence, rural India isn’t exactly a cosseting environment for single women. Sonali Kulkarni’s unnamed protagonist has the misfortune to be kidnapped into prostitution by a Madame and her henchmen, then gang-raped by a trio of macho louts when she’s plucky enough to escape. Unlikely salvation is at hand, however, in the form of transvestite Nirmal Pandey, a wandering entertainer who has himself obviously been around. Having found his own identity through dressing as a woman, he comes up with the idea of putting her in men’s clothes so that they can pass as a ‘straight’ couple and travel the country roads in relative safety on the return trek to her home village.

Certainly, screenwriter Timeri N. Murari has come up with a richly resonant central conceit, but the real excitement is that you simply don’t expect to see it in popular Indian cinema, an area thus far off limits for UK distributors and audiences alike

            Amol Palekar’s direction is relatively restrained for Bollywood (the dance number has been cut for this print), but pretty rough and ready to Western eyes, though once you adjust it’s easy to get caught up in the way it plays every emotion to the hilt.  It’s the film’s thematic daring that’s scintillating, though, as it explores the tension between sexual identity and social circumstance in a staunchly traditional society which offers little room for manoeuvre. While Kulkarni draws our sympathy, it’s Pandey’s caring, pragmatic, worldly-wise performance as the resourceful tranny that really draws you into the film’s imaginative sphere. Forget your preconceptions about Hindi cinema; this takes us on a touching, witty, always surprising journey through terrain that’s unfamiliar and human dilemmas that aren’t. Quite an achievement, in any language. Trevor Johnston TIME OUT (London)

-The film’s triumphs are its brilliant script – written by Timeri N. Murari- and its actors. Nirmal Pandey though uncomfortable in the love scenes is witty and feminine. Sonali Kulkarni, with a Smita Patel-like sensuousness, is equally moving. –INDIA TODAY

– The beauty of the film is a mixture of the story’s simplicity and the more complex issues it draws upon. what does it mean to be a man or a woman? Can we quell sexual longing in favour of companionship? A  moving and meditative film, The Square Circle plays quiet testimony to the talents of filmmakers on the fringes of commercial cinema. ASIAN ENTERTAINMENT.

– But this is mostly a sensitive exploration of sexual identity in a country where such issues aren’t open to negotiation. Special mention goes to the delightful Nirmal Pandey, it takes an actor of considerable talent to elicit sympathy. THE INDEPENDENT.

–One fears that the writer Timeri N. Murari is going to backtrack, but, although the conclusion involves a death, the film rights itself in a last scene, which, reassessing the truth the film-makers wish to convey, is handled with dignity and conviction. THE GAY TIMES. 

Opened at Curzon, West End, distributor Blue Dolphin.  Opened Paris, Distributor Avanti.  Sold to Denmark, Australian, Swedish, Nippon TV.  BBC-TV.

FESTIVALS: Winner of Grand Prix at Festival de Valenciennes, France.  Also shown at Toronto, The Hamptons, London, Melbourne, Copenhagen, Oslo, New York, Vancouver film festivals.

I also wrote, directed and produced a short film : THE ONLY THING.

In 1978/79 wrote the documentary trilogy ONLY AN AMERICA – The Last Cowboy, Goin’ Home, Detectives,. Directed by Michael Houldey, produced by Thames Television, London,