The story took place in India in 1938, on the banks of the Ganges, about widows in India.
Chuya, an eight-year-old girl, her husband died of illness, her father took away her bracelet, shaved her hair, put on white clothes, and sent her to a widow's home on the bank of the Ganges. The life of fasting before old age and death. Chuya followed the elderly widows in prayer and begging every day for very little food. She was not allowed to go out, lest she, including her shadow, contaminate others. One day, while listening to the pastor preaching, the child had a brainstorm and asked a naive question: "Is there a house for widows?" As a result, there was a curse: "You can say this, God bless our men not to have this fate." There was an elderly man in the widow's home who lived by recalling the dessert she ate at her seven-year-old wedding. Little Chuya used her begging money to secretly buy a Radu for her to eat. The old man felt the happiness of the outside world again. Died at night.
Kalyani, a young and beautiful widow, entered the widow's home at the age of 9 and never saw her husband. In order to maintain the livelihood of the widow's house, it is necessary to sell the body from time to time to pick up customers on the other side of the river. After a chance encounter, she fell in love with Karayang, the aristocratic male protagonist. Karajan is a young man who has received a new education and agrees with Gandhi's ideas, and decides to break the tradition and marry Kalyani as his wife. But on the boat to Karayan's house, when she learned the name of Karayan's father, she withdrew, returned to the widow's house again, drowned herself in the holy water of the Ganges, and used the holy water to wash her tainted soul and flesh. Karajan went to question his respected father, but the father said easily: "As a widow, it is her blessing to be able to sleep with the priest. But you can still treat her as a lover."
Shakundula, a middle-aged widow, chanted sutras every day in strict accordance with religious requirements. One day, the pastor asked her, "After so many years of sacrifice and dedication, are you closer to self-detachment?" "If self-detachment is the desire to break free from the world, then there is no". When Gandhi's ideas gradually spread and the widow could remarry and pass legislation, Shakundula's faith began to collapse, and she experienced questioning, confusion and painful struggles in her heart.
The name of the film is "Water", which translates as "Holy Water" or "Moon River" in Chinese, both of which are very beautiful names. Just like the name, the pictures of the film are dominated by the holy water of the Ganges and white clothes wrapped in plain clothes, which are soft and beautiful, coupled with the melodious and graceful music of India, which constitutes an audio-visual enjoyment. However, what is revealed under these beautiful pictures is such a cruel social reality. With half a finger, you can understand that being a widow is not a woman's fault, but society has regarded widows as ominous things since ancient times. In China's feudal society, there were many similar bad customs, but today, they have become history. However, in India, all these tragedies continue to be staged. According to statistics, by 2001, there were still 34 million widows in India living the same life as the film.
The film takes water as the main line. The Widow's House is on one side of the river, and the dignitaries live on the other side of the river. The river is a one-way street. Only people on the other side of the river can come over freely, but people on this side of the river cannot pass. This river, the holy river in the hearts of Hindus, washes dirt and sins in it every day, and scatters ashes into it every day for eternal life. However, it is also an insurmountable spiritual barrier. Hinduism gives widows three ways out: first, to bury their husbands as a sacrifice; second, to remarry to their husband's brother with consent; third, to repent in the widow's house, and spend their whole life begging and reciting sutras. As Dee Dee of the Widow's House said: "We are half of the husband, and when the husband dies, we are left with only half of us, and half of us are almost dead."
The origins of religions are all beautiful, but when the state and religion are unified and religion serves politics, those ruling classes will tamper with the dogma in the name of gods to consolidate their positions and interests. At the end of the film, Mahatma Gandhi sat in a crowded train station and delivered a very brief speech: "I have long believed that God is the truth, and now I know that the truth is God." The train carried Gandhi and his followers away, leaving those who were dazed and whose hearts were illuminated for a moment, looking forward to the fulfillment of the truth.
However, it takes a long process for the truth to overcome deep-rooted traditions. The caste system that has been abolished, the high dowry for women, and the inability of widows to remarry, etc., are still hot spots of social contradictions in India.
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