Milk and Opium

Running time: 83 mins

North American Premiere

Gone are the days of the Maharaja, who lavished his singers and instrumentalists with bountiful gifts. When Swaroop accompanies his Uncle Nizam and two other musicians on their travels, he learns that the journey of a traditional musician in India is less fruitful than he had imagined. A talented young boy from the small village of Keralia, Swaroop comes from generations of musicians who played for the kings and rajputs. But now there are no more kings, and the rajputs are broke.

On its trek from Keralia to Delhi, the group of musicians faces one disappointment after another. Swaroop becomes disillusioned with the life he once romanticized and discovers disconcerting aspects of his uncle?s character. When he longs to find something different from Keralia, every place he goes seems the same, and when he finally does enter a new world, he wonders whether he should have left his village at all.

Director Joel Palombo presents a story about people who must survive and define themselves in lost, evolving and colliding cultures, and he tells a tale about the passion that sustains one boy. Full of heart and excellent musical performances, Milk & Opium is a special treat for the music-loving viewer.

Preceded by: Los Coyotes; dir. Lee Isaac Chung; 21min.; A gang is hired to bring a boy across the border to his father but get stranded in the desert instead, and the boy wounded.

GLOBAL LANDSCAPES