The film on the life of Alexandra David-Neel is taking a while to be ready for release. The post-production work is taking longer than expected and now it seems that it won’t be released before the end of December. A whole month to go.
A few of us had the chance of seeing the rushes of the first part in summer this year. The scenes shot in Sikkim are really impressive. The scenes in the snow have been shot with such an artistic eye that it’s a visual delight. The costumes of the scenes shot in Sikkim are also very well done. The costume designer Edith was really a perfectionist and had done her research thoroughly before coming to Pondicherry. Unfortunately the same can not be said of the Indian woman who was in charge of the Indian costumes in other scenes.
If only there were proper training institutes in India where people could learn how to be historically accurate where costumes and accessories are concerned.
The thing which impressed me most about the work done by Edith was the way got shoes made for each and every character as well as for the extras. There were fifty pairs of shoes, all carefully hand-stitched. And no one was ever going to see the ones worn by the ladies because they wore long dresses that touched the floor.
This is something India could learn from.
