Mark Reviews Movies: FIRE IN THE MOUNTAINS

Fire in the Mountains, Kino Lorber

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Review by Mark Dujsik | May 19, 2022

Change is coming to India, but the area at the center of Fire in the Mountains remains the same. Writer/director Ajitpal Singh's debut feature is set near a Himalayan village in that country, surrounded by beauty but filled with everyday strife.

There's much to admire here, from the way Singh (along with cinematographer Dominique Colin) gradually gives the staggering vistas of this place a sense of the routine (Those long walks will do that), to the naturalistic performances from the cast, and to the story's central conflict, which is both domestic and philosophical. A married couple, Chandra (Vinamrata Rai) and Dharam (Chandan Bisht), have reached a tipping point in their relationship. Their son Prakash (Mayank Singh Jaira) suffered an unspecified accident, requiring surgery on his legs, but while the doctor believes the boy should be walking again by now, he remains unable to.

The family runs an inn in the mountains and are struggling to convince guests to make the long hike. Money is tight, and while news on the radio speaks of India going to space, this place and the people within it remain in a kind of financial, cultural, and social stasis.

Chandra wants to pay for doctors and convince the local powers-that-be to petition the government for a road to be built, making trips to the hospital easier and, hence, more regular than they are now. Dharam is certain that the boy can be cured by spiritual means, so he's spending money the family really doesn't have to pay a local guru and saving for the man to perform a sacred—and expensive—ritual.

The simplicity of this conflict, along with its underlying debate between pragmatism and faith, gives it some grounded significance. Rai's performance, which imbues the character with quiet battle between resilience and despair, is particularly effective, and Bisht is solid as the husband, a seemingly naïve and caring man whose zealotry starts to overwhelm his familial responsibilities and his personality.

Singh's storytelling is methodical and insightful when it comes to these two characters and the mounting battle between them. While the film may be short, though, it isn't quite to the point. The filmmaker's screenplay includes some other characters—such as the couple's daughter Kanchan (Harshita Tiwari) and Dharam's widowed sister Kamla (Sonal Jha)—and conflicts—the daughter's obsession with becoming famous on social media, as well as a boy from her school, and Kamla's growing distrust, frustration, annoyance, or something similar with her extended family.

Along with these underdeveloped threads, which are sometimes left dangling, Singh includes some other hastily established but ignored notions, such as political and religious corruption on the local level. In introducing but neglecting these other story elements, Fire in the Mountains loses a bit too much focus on the central relationship and of the potential impact of its fiery, ironic resolution.

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