The Siddis, a community unrepresented in Indian cinema, is under the spotlight in Rhythm of Dammam, an exceptionally evocative, visually arresting film written and directed by Kerala-born, New York-based Jayan Cherian.

The film premiered this week at the 55th International Film Festival of India in Goa. It is now headed to the International Competition line-up of the upcoming 29th International Film Festival of Kerala.

Rhythm of Dammam – the title alludes to a musical tradition germane to the Siddi way of life – shines a light on the plight of the marginalised Afro-Indian tribe that languishes at the bottom of India’s social hierarchy.

In 2013, Cherian’s debut feature, Papilio Buddha, probed systemic and physical violence perpetrated against Dalits, women and the environment. Three years later, he made Ka Bodyscapes, a film about three rebellious millennials who defy notions of gender and sexuality perpetuated to a change-averse society.

Rhythm of Dammam isn’t quite as subversive but, like the filmmaker’s previous films, is political to the core. Using relatively muted means, it examines the marginalization of the Siddis who have suffered centuries of oppression.

Cherian’s script, which draws liberally from his extensive documentation of the lives of the forest dwellers, alludes tangentially yet unambiguously to the obliteration of the endangered minority’s history, culture and language.

Rhythm of Dammam, lit and lensed by Sabin Uralikandy, has the tone and texture of a documentary. However, the seeds of an ethnographic film embedded in the film are grafted upon a full-blown fictional structure for the purpose of elucidation. The strategy works wonderfully well.

The film’s protagonist, a 12-year-old Siddi boy, Jayaram (Chinmaya Siddi), struggles to come to terms with the demise of his grandfather Rama Bantu Siddi (Parashuram Siddi). His anguish, bewilderment and fears are aggravated by the ways in which the adults around him react to the death and its aftermath.

His alcoholic, debt-ridden father Bhaskara (Prashant Siddi, widely known to Kannada movie fans), bickers endlessly with his younger brother Ganapathi (Nagaraj Siddi). The two men have their eyes on what the deceased man is believed to have bequeathed to them.

Their home and the land on which it stands are in danger of being seized by the upper-caste landlord to whom Bhaskara owes a few thousand rupees. He hopes to avert the eventuality with the inherited money. But the box Bhaskara digs out of a corner of the house contains trinkets of little material worth.

To Jayaram, however, the heirloom, no matter how worthless, become a ready, if unsettling, conduit to the hoary roots of his brutally exploited tribe who were brought to India as slaves by Portuguese and Arab traders and thereafter left to deal with continuing subjugation and persecution over many centuries.

The principal actors in Rhythm of Dammam, set in Yellapur in the Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka, where a large percentage of Hindu Siddis are concentrated, are all non-actors from the community. The actors cast as non-tribals, all tertiary characters – the landlord, a doctor, or an instructor in a tribal boys’ hostel – are (or look like) real people.

Cherian sets the actors free to improvise their performances, songs and dances. Many extended shots with a static camera provide naturalistic, unmediated frames to create a tangible context for the sufferings of the Siddis even as Jayaram’s visions of his forebears transport the boy, and the audience, to a surreal, often disturbing, zone.

The assimilation of the Siddis we see in the film is complete, so, ironically, is their alienation from mainstream India. They speak a creole of Konkani, which is the language of their religious chants. Their gods and rituals are Hindu. But their spirit – embodied in the white-robed figure of the grandfather Jayaram sees and touches in his dreams/nightmares – is driven by a yearning for an identity.

Politics makes its emphatic way into Rhythm of Dammam. The songs and dances of the Siddis, performed to the accompaniment of the dual-headed cylinder drums called dammam, which also gives their principal musical tradition its name.

The dances are studiedly unchoreographed. The actors work themselves up into a frenzy and create their own moves once they get into the swing of the music. It is marked by a distinctly Afro accent.

Haunted by what his grandpa is trying to tell him, Jayaram turns febrile, teeters on the edge of delirium, and is branded a problem child in need of healing. A fretful mother, an aunt possessed by Goddess Yellamma, a community shaman and a doctor who prescribes psychiatric treatment suggest ways to help the boy tide over his problem.

Jayaram’s fragile state of mind reflects the reality of a community that dangles between a past they have all but forgotten and a present that they would rather put behind them.

A young man raps angrily, bemoaning the community’s loss of the soul, language and identity. The languages Jayaram speaks serve to denote how far removed the Siddis of India are from their Bantu roots.

In Jayaram’s school, the medium of instruction is Kannada. The teacher, a non-Siddi, makes the students recite a patriotic pledge before testing the students’ knowledge of the world’s seven continents. Jayaram is lost in thought.

The teacher ridicules him. He asks: Where do you live, Jayaram? Please, the boy replies. That is the name of his village. Jayaram’s ancestry, straddling two continents, is shrouded in a dense haze. For him, the assertion of specificity of location stems from a desire to belong.

When Jayaram is admitted to a hostel, the mass prayer there, rendered in Sanskrit, is overtly religious. Every step that he moves away from his moorings is indicative of the blows that his ancestors have faced.

Amid the politics that Rhythm of Dammam espouses, Cherian sprinkles the narrative with pure magic seen through the pristine eyes of a pre-teen boy. The tender, poetic imagery suggests a despairing search for stability amid a frightening absence of certitude.

Rhythm of Dammam trains its empathetic spotlight on the troubles of one community. But not only does the film give voice to the voiceless, it also speaks to all those who find themselves painted into a corner by history.

Hitting all the right notes, Rhythm of Dammam laments the undermining of a civilisational tapestry that thrives on diversity.

Back in the 1990s, as Disney’s second golden age of animated
movies surged, the company entered the sequel business, churning out follow-ups
to their popular titles. For the most part, these represented inferior products
and Disney knew it, but the goal was to expand branding rather than create art.
Although featuring the original voice actors, even the best were characterized
by shallow stories, cut-rate animation, and lackluster songs. Instead of going
the theatrical distribution route, Disney opted for direct-to-video releases –
a decision that created a lucrative revenue stream for more than a decade. In
some ways, Moana 2 feels like a throwback to those ‘90s sequels – a movie
that was made more to capitalize on the popularity of a character than because
there was a compelling new story to tell. Moana 2 features top-notch
animation and songs that are better than passable but the plot feels like a regurgitation
of elements from the first movie combined with bits and pieces of other Disney
animated projects from across the years.

Moana 2 began life as a planned Disney+ series taking
the character on new adventures. Upon seeing footage from the series, Disney
CEO Bob Iger thought it was “too good” for direct-to-streaming and had the production
team rework the series into a movie. Although the result feels reasonably
self-contained, an unevenness in pacing and some narrative hiccups are evidence
of the late-innings metamorphosis. The result will likely please the legions of
Moana fans and is easily digestible for accompanying parents even if Moana
2 falls short of being the next Disney classic.

The story transpires three years after the original (even if
Moana’s little sister, Simea, seems only a little older). Moana, now a revered wayfinder,
has been taking long trips away from home in the company of her pet rooster,
Heihei, and pig, Pua, seeking to find other tribes of humans. She learns that
the storm god Nalo has cast a curse that prevents diverse groups of people from
contacting each other. In order to reverse the curse, she must find the mystical
island of Motufetu and raise it from the ocean depths. To this end, she builds
a bigger canoe and recruits a crew of three: warrior Moni (Hualalai Chung),
engineer and craftswoman Loto (Rose Matafeo), and grumpy farmer Keke (David
Fane). As she sets out, the demigod Maui (Dwayne Johnson), who is separately on
his own quest to find Motufetu, is captured by one of Nalo’s allies, Matangi (Awhimai
Fraser), possibly to be used as bait to lure Moana.

Moana 2 features surprisingly little in the way of
conflict – the climax, which is sufficiently suspenseful, is more of a
human-versus-nature battle – and the main villain, Nalo, appears sparingly. It seems
that the filmmakers may have visions of making him a Thanos-style “Big Bad” who
remains in the background (at least for now). This ongoing-adventure approach
makes more sense for a TV series than in a movie, although a box office win for
Moana 2 would guarantee the greenlighting of more sequels. Visually, the
movie pops although there are no noticeable advances from the first film
(perhaps because this form of animation has reached full maturity). Although
the first half of the story is light on action, things ramp up during the final
45 minutes.

One of the biggest disappointments in Moana 2 is the
lack of direct interaction between Moana and Maui. Once they are co-located,
the camaraderie from the first film re-ignites but it takes nearly an hour
before the two share the screen. For kids wanting to see the characters resume
their banter, that’s an awfully long time to wait.

With Lin-Manuel Miranda having stepped away from songwriting
duties to work on Mufasa, Abigail Barlow & Emily Bear came on board
to collaborate with composers Mark Mancina and Opetaia Foa’i. Although the
movie’s songs are a step up from generic, they lack the dynamism evident in
Miranda’s contributions to Moana. Moana’s new anthem, “Beyond,” echoes “How
Far I’ll Go” without reaching the same emotional heights. Likewise, while Maui’s
“Can I Get a Chee Hoo?” is fun and energetic, it’s not “You’re Welcome.” An
argument can be made that the musical highlight of Moana 2 is “We Know
the Way” – a reprise of the Miranda-penned song from the first film.

Overall, Moana 2 does enough to fit the bill of solid
family entertainment. It accomplishes the most important thing for any sequel: reunite
the original characters with each other and the audience. Its high points lack
the amplitude of its predecessor’s pinnacles but it avoids craters. Rather than
taking any sort of bold step forward, Moana 2 is more of the same.
Although that can be seen as a positive, it feels a little disappointing that this
is the best Disney was able to craft after an eight-year wait.

Moana 2 (United States, 2024)

“Ghosts of Red Ridge” is a low-budget Western that tries to be a ghost story. It’s not anything to write home about in either genre.

There’s some nice lived-in detail in the locations, the dusty, dirty costumes and almost-colorful characters. But that plot. Those characters.

Owen Williams stars as the sheriff of Red Ridge, a guy so haunted by the violence of the place and his job that he starts seeing the dark-eyed dead.

This little piece of Texas (a long-standing movie set in Arizona) popped up as a mining town, but the precious metals rush was a bust. Even waiting for the railroad to come through isn’t enough to keep the locals from lashing out.

With Trent (John Marrs) and Gretchen (Lena Wilcox) running a gang bent on robbing the general store (by proxy) and a stagecoach converted to freight hauling, it’s all Sheriff Dunlap and his deputy (Trent Culkin) can do to go a whole day without a shootout.

There’s backstabbing afoot, and a land scheme in play. Neither of them makes any sense.

The period-correct but sparse Gammons Gulch Movie Set (Is it still for sale?) lays out a common problem for no-budget Westerns — more extras and cast members than buildings to house, feed and employ them. It’s a convincing looking village, but just a bare bones “movie” version of an Old West town.

That’s quibbling, as is any mention of the movie’s dialogue anachronisms and the screwy choice to have the sheriff a well-read man into thermodynamics, “kinetic theory” and the like.

Maybe he should be reading up on the law — misexplaining “due process” to a stranger (Griffin Wade) who just happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“You’re a good man,” saloon gal Mary (Mercedes Peterson) declares. “Some things ‘good’ can’t fix.”

That might be the best line of dialogue. The worst?

“They went THATaway!”

There’s a hold-up by highwaymen (and a highwaywoman), a shipment of nitroglycerin to contend with and with every new body, the sheriff has another face to put on the apparitions that fill his dreams and rattle his waking hours.

I always appreciate the degree of difficulty filmmakers take on when they tackle a period piece, especially a Western, instead of the broke movie maker’s favorite genre — horror.

But director Stefan Colson and screenwriter Brandon Cahela take their shot at trying it both ways, and fail in both genres.

Rating: unrated, violence, profanity

Cast: Owen Williams, Trent Culkin, Griffin Wade, Lena Wilcox and John Marrs.

Credits: Directed by Stefan Colson, scripted by Brandon Cahela. A Well Go USA release.

Running time: 1:21