Heat and Dust

Plot synopsis:
In 1982, an Englishwoman named Ann (Julie Christie) begins an investigation into the fate of her great-aunt Olivia (Greta Scacchi), whose letters and diary she has inherited. She interviews the elderly Harry Hamilton-Paul (Nickolas Grace), who in his youth was Olivia's close friend when they were both living in India.
Anne’s search brings her to India, where the story of Olivia's life is told in flashbacks. In 1923, during the British Raj, Olivia, recently married to Douglas Rivers (Christopher Cazenove), a civil servant in the colonial administration, has come to join her husband in Satipur, in central India. Douglas is an attentive husband and the couple seems to be very much in love. When he insists that Olivia spend the summer in Simla to avoid the extreme heat, she refuses in order to remain with him. However, the conventional narrow society of the English memsahibs bores her. Mrs Saunders (Jennifer Kendal), the morbid wife of the local doctor, warns Olivia that all Indian men are potential rapists. Mrs Crawford (Susan Fleetwood), the Burra Memsahib, is kindly but equally conservative. The racist Doctor Saunders takes an instant dislike to Olivia. While the Anglo-Indian society seems to have little to offer Olivia, she is slowly enthralled by India itself. The region is being ransacked by a group of sanguinary bandits, and intrigues are opposing the British community led by Major Minnies and Mr. Crawford against the ruler of the neighboring princely state, the Nawab of Khatm (Shashi Kapoor). The British suspect him of being in league with a gang of bandits, allowing them to operate with impunity in exchange for a share of their booty.
The Nawab, a romantic and decadent minor prince who combines British distinction with Indian pomp and ruthlessness, invites all the Anglo-Indian officials and their wives for a dinner party at his palace. At the dinner, Olivia attracts the attention of the Nawab. Harry Hamilton-Paul enjoys a close intimacy with the Nawab and is a permanent guest at the palace. With his good humor and charm, Harry serves a sort of court jester and he is well liked even by the chain smoking and proud Begum Mussarat Jahan (Madhur Jaffrey), the Nawab's mother. In the midst of the intense summer heat, Harry falls ill and Olivia comes often to visit him at the Nawab's palace. The Nawab easily seduces Olivia and they engage in an illicit affair.
Following in Olivia’s footsteps, Anne comes to Satipur to live in the same surroundings that framed Olivia’s story more than fifty years earlier. She stays as the guest of an Indian family. The head of the household, Inder Lal (Zakir Hussain), is a polite civil servant who serves as her guide while she tries to get connected with the world that Olivia lived. Inder Lal is worried that their hitherto innocent relationship will be perceived as sexual. Lal is married with children and lives with his wife and his mother. Ritu, Lal's young wife, is an epileptic and he slowly, but surely, endears himself to Anne to whom he is attracted. Anne befriends Chid (Charles McCaughan), an American sanyasi and would-be convert to Hindu mysticism. Chid tries to seduce Anne with his antics, but she firmly rebuffs his sexual advances while becoming closer to Inder Lal. Eventually, Anne invites Lal into her bed.
Things get complicated for Olivia when she gets pregnant. She informs Douglas and the Nawab about it. Both men welcome the news. Douglas, unaware of his wife's infidelity, wishes for a son as blond as he is. The Nawab does not doubt that he is the father and he is overjoyed. He is in the midst of being deposed by the British, and views having a mixed-race heir as the ultimate revenge. Suspecting that the Nawab is the child's father, Olivia has an abortion in secret with Harry and the Begum's help, pretending to have a miscarriage. However, Olivia continues bleeding and is admitted to the hospital, where Dr. Crawford immediately discovers her ruse. Olivia runs away from the hospital early in the morning, eloping with the Nawab to Kashmir. She leaves Douglas broken-hearted, though he eventually remarries.
Like Olivia, Anne gets pregnant and she also decides to get an abortion, but backs down at the last minute. The Indian diet makes Chid falls sick and he returns to the United States. Anne also leaves behind the heat and dust of Satipur. She travels to the snowy mountains of Kashmir where Olivia spent her last years in solitude, seldom visited by the Nawab. Anne plans to bear her child in a hospital nearby.

Tags: atmospheric, storytelling, flashback

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