Religion and Culture (the procession scene)

The procession:

In the first scene of the film “East is East” by Om Puri one can see a Christian procession with a crucifix, a Madonna figure and lots of flags, in an English working class neighbourhood. The shown people, even young people with a Muslim appearance, smile and one hears happy music. Then a typically English woman appears and a typically Muslim man is shown observing the procession. They're obviously the parents of the young Muslim looking people. So when the mother tells his children that the father comes back from mosque to watch the procession, they begin to ran hectically into a parallel street to hide.

During the mother rejoins to the father, the children bypass them and return back to the procession.

Analyse of the colour, sound and camera techniques:

The first scene of the film contains two important messages which are underlined through colours, sounds and camera techniques. At first, the film creates a relaxed and cheerful atmosphere which is hidden by the appearance of the father and the fear of his children to be seen.

However, this scene never loses all of its happiness because of the music playing during the whole scene. It is a catchy song with trumpets, drums and a choir dealing with processions and Christian religion. Therefore the music fits also to the content of the film.

As another aspect a few people are shown in a close-up shot with smiling and grinning face revealing happiness and pride to be part of the procession.

On top of that the procession is very colourful. The little Muslim boy showers confetti, and also the flags, banners and other material for the procession let us see many colours. Even this is a mean to show happiness.

The fear of the children is demonstrated mostly through the action and camera techniques. Particularly Meenah, the girl with the crucifix, loses her grin in all of a sudden in a medium shot. There's a lot of hectic in the voices of the actors and the children begin to run and hide because of having fear. Again Meenahs face, but also the faces of her siblings are shown in close-up shots during the run. They reveal stress and struggle, the happiness is gone from their faces.

Another term is the cocked camera angle showing from below one of the older boys stressed and in the background the crucifix, the figure of Madonna and the banners out of order. This shot reveals exactly the chaotic atmosphere.

To sum it up, one can say that already in the first scene of the film “East is East” the main subject and the main problem is shown clearly. The Khan children are caught up between to cultures, the culture of the country they live in, Britain, and the culture of their fathers country, Pakistan. Here the religious part of the family conflict is shown: The children want to take part in the religious traditions of their English environment, but their father doesn't want them to do so. He goes to mosque and his children have to go to mosque (that becomes already clear through their fear to be seen).