It's very well shot and well acted. But it strikes me as an immersive movie rather than a riveting one. I was quite bored after half an hour and gave up. For all it's splendor I was left thinking "So where's it going? What's the point?" Maybe that came later but I don't have the patience to sit through a lot of scenes that don't contribute to the plot.

A fantastic film about prejudice and injustice. Truly a classic and a must-watch!

Having seen around the time of release, I revisited it this year and was happy to see it's largely still very watchable. Whilst the characters now seem a little exaggerated, the themes still resonate today. Although seeing a browned up actor, this was early 80's, is uncomfortable.

Magnificent. Stands the text of time

There are good moments but some of the characters are cartoonish and playing up to silly stereotypes. Felt far too long for a story that never really threatens to get going. Some interesting depictions of the Raj however.

Alec Guinness was apparently so enamored with putting on brownface for David Lean that he did it again more than a quarter century later (after Lawrence of Arabia), and much darker. And strangely, it was not received with as much controversy as you might expect for a film that late; the British master of epics could get away with a lot. While much less biting than the Forster novel it is based on, Lean's cinematic adaptation of A Passage to India carries over many of the criticisms originally leveled against the British Raj, including assessments of character based on prejudice and hate that were ingrained not only into personal interactions but institutional practices. The establishment of this dynamic is rather clever - initially reserved to snide comments that a newly-arrived English delegation can brush off, the stances of the members of the established elite are brought to the forefront when a simple misunderstanding spins out of control. The tone of the film shifts widely in that moment, as what could have been a potboiler adventure of the period showcasing India as a tourist destination rather than a breathing country shifts to a bleak social drama. Nor are the criticisms limited to an overt, superficial hatred. The offense of refined sensibilities and an inability to condone healthy sexual expression actually serves as a trigger to the main plot, a near-laughable repression that is a hallmark of the Edwardian upper crust era of stiff collars and stiffer upper lips. The treatment of Davis's Adela in the aftermath of her recanted testimony, when she is abandoned by her supposed countrymen when she no longer can serve to support their twisted worldview, is a solid moment, and all of the above is interwoven with the development of sincere friendships that supercede cultural divides, rather than limiting the themes to simple "British bad, Indians good," content. While somewhat sanitized, intermittently predictable, and certainly not the same degree of pure visual expression that some have come to expect from Lean's prior work, A Passage to India is still a solid bookend to an internationally renowned directorial career. (3.5/5)

David Lean made two great films, Dr. Zhivago and A Passage to India.

It doesn't do anything subtlety and it isn't especially interesting.

One of the best movies ever produced by man

Visually beautiful. Poignant themes.

Beautiful, like a David Lean movie. Impressive acting and some wonderfully constructed scenes. But overall, long and tedious. I never appreciated Forster, either.

What a rarity it is to find a film about the relationship between British colonialists and the nationals whom they oppress that dares to go into the complexities of the issue and subvert the tropes that we have seen so many times before. I have struggled to connect to the other films directed by David Lean that I have seen with Lawrence of Arabia (1962), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) and Doctor Zhivago (1965) having incredible production values but stories that do not engage you and sometimes atrocious acting. Fortunately this film looks utterly beautiful but also tells a fascinating story that touches on many social issues while featuring a brilliantly crafted performance from Judy Davis who firmly establishes herself as one of the greatest actresses of all time. Sheltered young Briton, Adela Quested, Judy Davis, travels from England to Chandrapur, India with her companion Mrs. Moore, Peggy Ashcroft, who is the mother of her intended suitor Ronny Heaslop, Nigel Havers. When she arrives she is eager to meet Indians in an attempt to expand her worldview and ends up meeting idealistic Indian widow Dr. Aziz Ahmed, Victor Banerjee, who befriends Mrs. Moore. Ahmed pays exorbitant prices to escort the women to the Marabar caves but unfortunately when Quested enters one of the caves alone she experiences a mental breakdown of sorts and comes to believe that Ahmed raped her. Her accusation sends ripples through the fractured social groups in Chandrapur as the budding friendship between Ahmed and the kind Briton Richard Fielding, James Fox, is tested with Fielding being willing to attest to Ahmed's innocence. Fortunately, Quested eventually realizes she was mistaken but Ahmed's ideals and his life in Chandrapur has been destroyed as he turns against the British completely after realizing the full extent of their insidious racism. The film's portrayal of racism is interesting in that we see the characters who would have typically been white saviors, Moore and Fielding, either choose their own selfish desires over helping him or do nothing at all. Instead of having a character give a grandstanding speech that convinces everybody that racism is bad and they should stop persecuting Ahmed we see Fielding take a stand that ultimately has no impact. Even earlier in the film we understand that Moore and Quested are not evil but unaware of the great lengths that Ahmed has gone to in order to take them to the caves. For them this is just another day out, something routinely paid for by others, however for him this is the closest he has gotten to gaining the respect he deserves from Britons and the desperation with which he goes about taking care of them is sad to watch. At the end of the film we see that individual friendships can still survive but the nation as a whole remains hugely divided and the issue of racial inequality will not be solved quickly or easily. What makes Davis so astonishing is how well she is able to play a character who is so full of contradictions. We feel her discontent from the moment we meet her as her desire for a new, exciting life comes into conflict with her own fears and sexual repression. Simply the shocked, horrified and slightly titillated expressions on her face as she stares intently at sculptures depicting sexual intercourse draws you in while any understanding of her confused mind remains frustratingly out of reach. Despite her disastrous actions she is never fully unsympathetic as Davis convinces us of her character's internal struggle and her loneliness and dissatisfaction with the relationship she had intended to spend the rest of her life in. Davis is a revelation and should have won the Academy Award for Best Actress as she plays such a difficult role but pulls it off with flying colors. This is my personal favorite of the films that Lean has directed and while Amadeus (1984) was the best film of 1984 this film is still one of the best of the 1980s. Having seen this film several times I always find something new to appreciate in it and despite it's length every little moment and every scene feels absolutely essential and utterly engrossing.

A dream movie ab out India the country I wish to visit

The best movie score ever composed!

a slightly long film on race, class, and the privilege certain people obliviously enjoy and other people consciously don't enjoy during their lifetimes.

A well made, well shot and well acted historical drama. While it may not be David Lean's best, it is still a great film!

An underrated gem that may have seemed old fashioned in 1984 but now feels timeless. E. M Forster's novel is almost impossible to film and Lean was probably the only director brave enough to attempt it. The cinematography is superb as you would expect from a David Lean film. What is puzzling is why he did not shoot in widescreen. There are times when the screen is so crammed with people or scenery that it screams to be opened out to 70 mm. Maybe his reason was to increase the sense of claustrophobia experienced by Judy Davis' character, but compared to Lean's previous films it does feel small. Although Alec Guinness convinces as an Indian holy man, by 1984 it was really no longer acceptable to use white actors in place of Indian or Arab actors. The above niggles aside 'A Pasage to India' is a meticulously crafted and knowing critique of the hypocrisy and double-standards that characterized British colonial rule.

1001 movies to see before you die. I had seen this and merely not realized it. This movie deals with some very complicated race issues, but it's surprising that it still feels like a made for 온라인카지노추천 movie. It's a shame, because I had hoped for better from Lean. It did show me India in ways I had not seen before. It did make me still want to visit.

I loved this movie. I thought it was beautiful, interesting, well acted, and exciting. A great film.

Some novels cannot be translated to the screen and David Lean has demonstrated that "A Passage to India" is on e of them. The movie has none of the novel's subtlety and betrays the novels theme by becoming a dull moralizing melodrama. When I studied the novel in school, the question that the better students asked was 'Why could Professor Godpole not love the stone?" None of the novel's motavtings of that question appear in the movie and with this the movie betrays the novel. Even the novel's ending of "No, not yet'> in regard to the reconciliation among people is absent and substituted with a easy happy ending. This is a movie that is not worthy of the novel that it is based on.