Mind Your Language

It was while watching the film Devdas that I felt a thing very odd about the movie. I wondered how come the Director used Bengali words in the film when the film is a Hindi one. My argument is that, had he used the Bengali words in the movie to bring out the cultural flavor in the movie then he has really failed as a director. If he cannot bring out the cultural feeling with the images then he shouldn’t be making any more movies. The movie is being made in Hindi so that the Hindi viewers could understand it. I feel Bengali viewers will be happy enough watching the Bengali version.
The same happened while reading O Chandumenon’s Indulekha translated by Anitha Devasiya. The purpose of English translation is that others who cannot understand Malayalam are able to enjoy the book without much trouble. But unfortunately the book contains lot of Malayalam words. She has made it easy by adding a glossary in the end. So what’s the point in it!! She may have used the Malayalam words to bring out the cultural flavor but still it will only be understood by a Malayalee. Being a Malayalee myself I found the very interesting to read but I strongly feel this may not be the case for a foreigner who will have to time and again look into the glossary which can be such an irritating process and destroys the flow of the story.
I’m not against usage of other languages in the same book or film if it’s consistent. For eg., in the same book Indulekha there’s usage of Sanskrit slokas which is quite right as even in Malayalam version it’s in Sanskrit.
A fine example of such consistency can be seen in the movie Paths of Glory by Stanley Kubrick. The movie setting takes place during the World War I and the happenings going around in the French camp. Not even a single French word is used in the movie and even the style of the dialogue delivery is quite American. Its through images and other ways that Kubrick bring in the French substance. Kubrick could have used a easy way out by dropping French words every now and then.