The Hindu Business Line : Of adventure with a period touch

It is not a `time-pass' film. There is over two hours of erratic narration to sit through and given the many versions of the Pocahontas story available, you have to overlook veracity and take in the film as a cinematic experience. If you love pristine wilderness, a period touch and the human mind tucked off in such places, you will like this film.

Studio synopsis: "The New World is a sweeping adventure set amidst the first encounter of European and Native American cultures during the founding of the Jamestown Virginia settlement in 1607. Filmmaker Terence Malick brings to life his own unique interpretation of the classic tale of Pocahontas and her relationships with adventurer John Smith and aristocrat John Rolfe."

The film has done a great job of interpreting each scene and situation true to the words — new world. There is wonder, fear and plenty of nature in every step for the Red Indians. Even the Europeans in the film, to be fair, are not sure-footed conquerors. Thanks to guns and cannons, they dominate; when they starve, they betray their ugly side — still, on the whole, they are spared rigorous scrutiny and allowed to be benchmark God standard.

Following Disney's 1995 animated film, certain Powhatan Nation Web sites had pointed out that Smith was actually a vain adventurer and the natives, far from being barbaric, had helped the English during hard times. The New World respects these angles though it doesn't mention that Pocahontas' marriage to Rolfe was a pre-requisite for her freedom.

Rolfe's past and the reasons for Pocahontas being held hostage are also kept hazy; the myth appears to host different takes on these.

There are moments, particularly Pocahontas' easy acceptance of things European and Christian, when you suspect bias. Just what you would expect when Hollywood meets the barefoot and naked. But the ambience on screen is too good to abandon; it is further enhanced by the camera's romance with Q'Orianka Kilcher as Pocahontas. The chemistry is amply evident in lengthy footages, carried off well with no dialogue and only background score.

What the film lacks by way of coherent story telling, it more than makes up with its sensitive cinematography, suffusing scenes with the tension and amazement that accompanies anyone moving from one world to another. It contrasts the nature worshipping Native American outlook with the comparatively rigid tenets of European life, to evolve a visual grammar for Pocahontas' journey.

Colin Farrell's Smith betrays the shifty side of the self-loving adventurer; Christian Bale does well as Rolfe and Christopher Plummer is fittingly authoritative as Captain Christopher Newport. August Schellenberg as Chief Powhatan and Wes Studi as Opechancanough are veterans at similar roles. But the film belongs to little-known Kilcher; she will be remembered as one beautiful Pocahontas.

The New World releases in India on April 7. It is worth seeing.