‘Aamis’ is the Assamese word for what we call ‘non-veg’ in India, the flesh of animals as food. ‘Aamis’ starts off as a normal boy-meets-girl story and eventually takes a dark turn. Dr. NirmaliSaikia(Lima Das), a married pediatrician meets an anthropology researcher, SumonBaruah (ArghadeepBaruah), when his friend lands in a condition of emergency.
Nirmali and Suman connect instantly, developing a bond that leads them to different meat-eating expeditions. The film appears to be just another story of a young man attracted to an older woman but slowly the film takes a surprisingly dark turn.
Nirmalihas a pre-teen son and a husband who mostly stays away from home for work, he is generally immersed in his own work. Nirmala’s friend, Jumi who openly admits to having an extramarital affair and there is a determination in Nirmaliwhere she confesses how she will never be like her. Nirmali invites Suman to her house for dinner the day her husband comes back just to give herself and Jumi, a validation that there was no intimate affair between her and Suman.
‘Aamis’ chooses a way of expressing the unexpressed, that Indian Cinema might never have seen before. Anurag Kashyap called the movie directed by Bhaskar Hazarika, “that has ever come out of India before”. There are montages in the movie that shows close up of Nirmalias Suman imagining the pleasure he might be giving to Nirmaliby feeding her with his meat, a symbolism of the repressed desires of both the lead protagonists.
The movie never quite suggests how much insanity is acceptable in love. It just shows the insanity that begins to dominate an individual and their actions, and soon they are giving in parts of themselves to feed this hunger, this insanity. Nirmali fears eventually becoming the person Jumi was and doing whatever she had been, so she never quite accepts the fact to herself, that she was attracted to Suman and him on the other hand fears losing the ‘whatever’ he has with his ‘baideo’.
The fear of addiction almost instills in Nirmali, but then again the film never limits the levels of insanity the protagonists climb up to. They never touch each other and Suman always takes the front seat with the driver instead of the backseat with Nirmali.
‘Aamis’received its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival where it was nominated in five categories in the festival’s “International Narrative” section.
Text by: Sreyoshi Sil, IBTN9
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